


How to Train Your Voltron

by nerdy_cait05



Series: Riders of Voltron [1]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies), Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - How to Train Your Dragon Fusion, Coran is Gobber, Keith is Astrid, Kinda, Lance is Hiccup, M/M, Mutual Pining, Shiro is Stiock, Slow Burn, Voltron au, and so on and so forth - Freeform, broganes, klangst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-06-01
Packaged: 2018-09-24 19:14:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 38,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9781208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdy_cait05/pseuds/nerdy_cait05
Summary: When Lance McClain, a Viking Paladin who aspires to hunt dragons, becomes the unlikely friend of a young dragon herself, he learns there may be more to the creatures than previously assumed.Rated T for fantasy violence and some light language, because…Vikings.





	1. First, Catch Your Dragon

**Author's Note:**

> So this spawned from the drawings that parfeitpari on tumblr made (PLEASE go check her out at http://parfaitperi.tumblr.com/), and she was amazing and beautiful enough to let me write this for you all!! 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :3

A long, long time ago, there was a relatively tall viking with a relatively short name walking through deep snow.  This relatively tall viking’s name was Lance Charles McClain, and he usually didn’t mind water in any form, but on this night he was in a foul mood.  His rival and fellow classmate (if you can call what Coran teaches as a “class”) had bested and embarrassed him in front of everyone...again.

 

“Welcome to Arus,” the viking muttered to himself, shivering, “It’s twelve days north of Hopeless and a few degrees south of Freezing to Death.  It’s located solidly,” he grunted and tried to shuffle a few steps forward, “on the Meridian of Misery.”

 

A large treebranch snapped overhead, dropping nearly a foot of snow right on Lance’s head.

 

“Oh, really?” the boy shouted up at the heavens, “Quiznak that’s cold!”

 

Lance shook his head, trying to get the snow out of his dark hair as a sound like thunder came from the skies.  This effectively shut up the fuming boy and sent him sprinting towards his village, because he knew what that sound was, and it wasn’t thunder.  You see, this village had a bit of a pest problem.  Where most places have mice or mosquitoes, Arus has…

 

“Dragons!” Lance shouted as he came within earshot of the buildings.

 

In an instant the roads and pathways were full of vikings running and shouting, torches being lit and buckets being filled with water.  Lance pushed through the crowd, looking for his friends as the first dragon of the night touched down, spitting fire everywhere.  He barely got a look at the creature before he was forcibly pulled backwards by his coat and pinned against a building by strong hands.

 

“Lance!  What’re you doing out here?” His best friend Hunk, hissed in his face.

 

Lance tried to break free of the monstrous grip on his shoulder, “Hunk, chill out!  I was just on a walk, now let me go get a sword!”

 

Hunk stepped back from his friend but didn’t relinquish his hold, “How about no?  Don’t you remember what just happened, like, two hours ago?”

 

Lance growled in frustration, “Dude!  There’s a Crimson Nightmare out there!  I gotta get out there and slay it before somebody else does!”

 

Then Hunk  _ did _ let go of his friend, but only to facepalm in exasperation, “Lance, you’re my best friend and I love you, but we’ve been over this  It isn’t safe for you out there, or for anyone else if you’re out there for that matter, so just stay and help fill up the water buckets here, okay?”

 

Lance was about to protest, but then a tiny mass of glasses and hair shot around the corner.

 

“Hunk!” the small viking screeched, “We need you out here, a Yellow Gronkle came out of nowhere and is threatening to smash down all the silos!”

 

“I’m coming, Pidge!” Hunk cried, hefting his axe over his shoulder and running to the street.  With one last glance at his friend he entreated, “Lance.  Stay...here…” he pointed a threatening finger and ran off with the small viking girl.

 

Lance didn’t get a chance to protest before they were both gone, off to repair weapons and bring down dragons, like they always did.  While Lance was stuck with fire duty.  He didn’t have time to pout, however, as out of nowhere the building to his right erupted in flame.  Out of reflex her charged for the well in the center of the square, where there were already four or five kids drawing up and bringing back buckets of water to douse the flames.  He ripped the wood out of the nearest child’s hands and sprinted over to the burning house, careful not to spill too much of the precious liquid.  He threw the contents over the fire, hoping the bucket he and the few kids behind him would be enough to put it out before much more damage was done.

 

All around him there was shouting and yelling and screaming as the dragons arrived in groups and stole livestock and other valuables, causing destruction with every fiery breath and smash of their massive bodies.  As Lance ran around throwing bucket after bucket on houses and recently empty sheep pens, he caught sight of the usual suspects fighting and flying.  He caught sight of Hunk saving sheep and chasing after Yellow Gronkles; it was hard to miss either of the two, as dragon and hunter alike barrelled through things and people in their respective pursuits.  He also saw Coran, the village blacksmith and somewhat kooky old guy, fighting a nadder as he yelled and screamed.

 

Closer to the center of all the action where the most fires were being started fought the village’s tireless Chief Shiro, his metal arm sharper and more deadly than any double-edged axe as he chased after a group of two-headed Zippleblacks, nearly half a dozen men behind him.  And then, where the flames were the worst and only kept coming, was a Crimson Nightmare.  That particular dragon has a nasty habit of setting itself on fire, and it gave Lance more arm and headaches than any other dragon.  But even worse than the dragon was the one viking who was dumb enough to challenge it alone.

 

In the center of a ring of flames stood Keith Takashi Kogane, adoptive brother of Chief Shiro and Lance’s arch rival.  As far as Lance knew, the black-haired boy had never actually  _ killed _ a dragon before, but everyone said  he was sure to someday soon, whether it be on the field or in the ring.  Because that’s all that mattered on Arus.  Dragon slaying and hunting was what these people lived and breathed.  If you didn’t hunt dragons, or at least have the guts to attack them, you were no one.  And if you  _ did _ try and failed because you got scared, you were less than no one.  Or if you were Lance, a bit of both.

 

The brunette stood for a moment, watching the showdown between the Nightmare and Keith.  Every time Keith would move in to strike with his sword, the dragon would blast hot magma at his face, and he’d have to retreat, then charge again.  Soon enough, though, the dragon was too slow, and right as Keith was about to go in for the finishing strike, a sound like a screaming arrow penetrated the night’s clamor.

 

“Blue Fury!” a voice shouted.

 

“Get down!” another commanded.

 

Lance didn’t have time to think as the buildings all around him exploded, sending him flying through the air and crashing into an empty sheep trough.  He saw the Crimson Nightmare make its escape and scanned the skies desperately for a glimpse of the other dragon.

 

A Blue Fury.  The creature said to be the unholy offspring of lightning and death.  This dragon never shows itself, never takes anything, and never ever misses.  The only way the Arusian vikings even knew it existed was because of the blue ashes that remained of whatever it burned, thus its name.

 

Lance shot up from the feed trough and sprinted to the forge, where he knew Pidge would be.  He earned indignant shouts and exclamations from several people he pushed past, catching another glance of Keith charging beside his brother, and careened through the forge’s back door.

 

“Lance!” Pidge, Coran’s apprentice and Lance’s good friend, “What’re you doing here?  You should be helping put out the flames; there’s a Blue Fury out there!”  she threw a newly repaired weighted net out the shop window, where vikings clamored and shouted for their weapons to be fixed pronto.

 

“I know!” Lance replied, running to the workbench where Pidge kept her gadgets and unfinished projects, “That’s why I’m going to catch it with this!”

 

The small girl stopped a moment to see what Lance was taking from her shop, “Lance, no!  That one hasn’t been tested yet!  The suspension and rigging aren’t secure, and—”

 

“I’ll figure it out!” he yelled back, carting the enormous invention out the door, “Don’t worry!”

 

He ran out into the night, avoiding several near-death experiences with vikings and dragons alike as he tracked what he hoped were the Blue Fury’s movements.  Finally he came to a spot overlooking the expansive lance and dense forests of Arus and unloaded his cargo.  Pidge had been designing this invention especially for him to take down dragons, and from what he’d gleaned when she showed him the plans, it worked like a crossbow, only with a weighted net instead of an arrow, and with about 100 more pounds of force.  Lance had given the mechanic the idea when he said he wished crossbow could be as effective at grounding dragons as nets, and just as fast as them, too.

 

“C’mon, gimme something to shoot at, gimme something to shoot at,” Lance muttered to himself as he searched the night sky.  

 

The half moon shone brightly above him, casting a blue glow across the snow-covered land.  Any other time he would’ve taken a moment to appreciate the beauty that was his home, but just then he saw it.  A large, leathery mass as dark as the night sky circling to strike.

 

Lance put his eye to the scope of his weapon and located the creature in it.  He watched the way it was flying, adjusted the trajectory of his strike to anticipate its next movement, took a deep breath, and pulled the trigger.

 

Ropes tightened and released, gears turned, and the entire invention pushed against Lance with the backlash of ejecting the net into the air.  He was knocked to the ground from the sheer force, but jumped right back up to watch the dark form of the dragon seize and fall through the air, the net having met its mark perfectly.

 

Lance’s jaw hung open in shock and amazement as he heard the Blue Fury’s cry fade into the night through the trees.  He had done it.  Lance, the clumsy, water-brained viking that started more fires than he put out, had shot down a Blue Fury, something no one had ever done before.

 

He jumped in the air and squealed like a kid, “I did it!  Oh gods, I did it!  I just took down a Blue Fury” he hopped around and turned back towards where the rest of the village was still fighting, “Did anyone see that?”

 

There was a growl from behind Lance, and he spun around to see a Crimson Nightmare crawl up the ledge beside him, yellow eyes trained right on the boy.

 

Lance’s voice was small, “Oh great, just you.”

 

He barely had time to run before the dragon blasted boiling magma at him, incinerating Pidge’s invention.

 

_ ‘She’s gonna kill me later.’ _ Lance thought as he ran from the nightmare and tried to avoid getting barbequed.  He thought, belatedly, that it would’ve been a good idea to grab a sword before running out this far, where no other humans were around.  Or possibly an axe.  Or a knife.  Or anything.  But instead all Lance could do was run, scream, and hope for rescue, which he did.

 

The young viking sprinted through pathways up the mountainous terrain, trying to lose the monstrous creature, but to no avail.  He ran around a corner and hid behind one of the large lampost-like fixtures the village constructed to light up the dark nights.  Lance hoped that it would be enough to hide his scrawny figure from the dragon, but of course the creature just spat fire at the post, trying to burn through to the boy on the other side.  The heat was almost unbearable, and Lance tried to make himself as small as possible to not get torcehd.  Suddenly, the onslaught of flames stopped, and after a moment Lance peered around the side of the mostly burnt post and saw nothing.

 

“Huh,” he laughed in relief and took a step backwards straight into something warm and scaly.  He flinched and turned around slowly, once again coming face-to-face with the Nightmare, and as it opened its mouth Lanec had the fleeting thought of,  _ ‘Well, at least they won’t have to burn my body’ _ before something black and white slammed into the creature, sending it tumbling away.

 

Lance stood frozen as he watched Shiro battle the dragon.  He had never seen the Chief fight up close before as the man had always been obscured by other vikings or Lance had been rushing to put out fires, and it was a sight to see.  Lance recalled one of the stories that said Shiro had broken a rock with his bare hands when he was only a baby, and watching him now, the young viking believed it.

 

Shiro charged and punched the dragon right on the nose, stunning the creature before it gathered enough wits to summon flames.  Only, the Nightmare had seemed to reach its limit torching the lampost and Lance, because all it was able to spit out was a lump of red-hot coals.

 

“You’re all that?” Shiro muttered as he decked the creature again with an uppercut, and was about to slash it to ribbons with his sword arm when the lampost shuddered and broke, sending the top of the flaming structure rolling between them and down the pathway towards the village.  The noise and commotion distracted Shiro for a moment, and that’s all the dragon needed for it to spread its wings and take flight.

 

Once the dragon was gone Lance turned and watched as the lampost’s flaming top careened down the mountain, people shouting and screaming to get out of its way before crashing into the group of Zippleblacks they had managed to capture.  The two vikings could only watch as they all got away.

 

Lance turned warily to his Chief, who looked even more tried than usual as he stared at the sky.  He sighed and then caught sight of Lance, who flinched under his gaze.

 

“Lance McClain.” Shiro sighed like everyone did when they said his name, “Care to explain what happened this time?”

 

“Well―” Lance stuttered, “It’s a funny story―”

 

Shiro halted his blabbering mouth with a look, one Lance got from everyone all the time.  The look that said,  _ I suffer your excuses only because I have to. _

 

“Okay but I caught a Blue Fury.”

 

Shiro closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Lance, I know you’re trying, and really I appreciate your dedication, but―”

“No, it’s true!” Lance interrupted, “It went down just over the western wood!  If we could send a team out there I’m almost positive they’d find it!”

Shiro sighed and noticed they had an audience as the villagers started to gather around the origin of the recent chaos.  He straightened and looked at Lance with a firm gaze, “Lance, enough.  As I’m sure you’re aware, winter is coming, and fast, and we have to prepare accordingly.  We can’t spare extra time and resources to go and look for something that  _ might _ be there.”

“I’m telling you the truth!  I saw the Blue Fury go down!”

The Chief’s eyes hardened, an expression Lance had never seen directed at another member of the village before, “Then where  _ exactly _ did it land, McClain?  Tell me that, and I’ll send out a group to find it.  Until then, I think you should return home before you burn down any more of this village.”

Lance could feel the weight of every person’s gaze there, compiled with his shame and anger.  He turned around and headed towards his home alone, the crowd for once parting to let him pass without impediments.  He was ashamed of the mess and scene he’d caused, but more than anything he was determined.  Being called clumsy and stupid was one thing, but Lance was no liar.

  
And he’d prove it by bringing back the heart of the Blue Fury.


	2. A Chance in a Million

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance finds that dragon-hunting isn't all it seems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my goodness, you all have been so amazing and wonderful with your comments and kudos, thank you SO MUCH!! Your encouragement and love for this project has really helped fuel it, thank you again!
> 
> Also, if you haven't, please go check out @parfeitperi on tumblr, she's the one who created this AU, and I'm so thrilled to bring her thoughts to life
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :3

_Lance_

Lance’s resolve to go out and find the Blue Fury right then and there only lasted until he got to his front door, however, because Hunk and Pidge arrived right behind him.

 

“Curse you and your mile-long legs!” Pidge huffed, resting her hands on her knees, “I almost had to have Hunk carry me and my tiny ass over here.”

 

“Yeah, I hate those things,” Hunk grimaced, also a little out of breath.

 

“Look, guys, it might be better if you weren’t seen with me,” Lance said, “Obviously I’m going Berserk.”

 

Pidge frowned, “That is _not_ what Shiro said.”

 

“Yeah,” Hunk immediately agreed, “Besides, if anyone is part Berserk, it’s gotta be Coran.  He has no sense of what’s ethical or reasonable.”

 

“Exactly.”

 

Lance shook his head. “I just wish he’d take me seriously for once, or at least listen!  It’s not like I’m the only one who makes mistakes!  Take Keith for example―”

 

“Oh here we go,” Pidge groaned.

 

“―Pidge, the guy acts without thinking!  Have you _ever_ seen him take something slow, like ever?  He just jumps in and attacks dragons, with no regard to personal safety whatsoever!”

 

“Well, we are Vikings,” Hunk interjected, “It’s a bit of an occupational hazard.”

 

“Yeah, but seriously!  I mean, everyone looks up to him like he’s the best thing, while I’m treated with disdain like― like―” Lance spluttered, looking for the right word.

 

“Like your brain’s a paper arrow?” Pidge suggested, earning a sharp nudge from Hunk, “Ow!”

 

“―A talking fishbone!” Lance finally finished.

 

“Aw, come on Lance, it’s not _that_ bad!” Hunk tried to be optimistic.

 

“Well, that’s easy for you, Hunk, you’re the perfect Viking: an extra large boy with beefy arms and knowledge that can kill!”

 

Pidge sighed, “Look, Lance, you’re obviously really agitated right now and need to cool down a bit.  I’m going to go home, and we can figure out where to go from this in the morning.  See you both.” the girl waved and walked away towards her home, sparing one last concerned look at Lance.

 

Hunk sighed, “We should hit the hay, too.  We have a long day tomorrow.” he pushed past Lance into the house, yawning.

 

“Yeah,” Lance agreed, the image of the Blue Fury falling through the sky seared in his brain, “We do.”

 

* * *

 

_Keith_

Keith had always liked early mornings.  He liked the fresh, crisp air, the frost on the grass, and the shy sunlight peering over the mountains.  But mostly he liked how peaceful it was.  No one bustling about, no one fighting for honor in the arena, no dragons threatening his home.  Just the quiet beauty of morning.

 

As the sun came up Keith knew he needed to head to town hall; Shiro had called for a council meeting last night to convene at first light, and he liked Keith to be present for them.  Keith had a sneaking suspicion that Shiro was so adamant about this point because he wanted Keith to become Chief were something to happen to him, but the young viking wasn’t sure that’s what he wanted to do.  Besides, he didn’t like to think about anything bad happening to Shiro, in any form or fashion.

 

When Keith reached the large stone building, he could tell that he was actually early to one of the meetings for once, from the lack of people already there.  Shiro stood overlooking a map of their island and the surrounding areas on the table in front of him, with the crazy blacksmith Coran standing near him.

 

“I just don’t know what to do with him, Coran.” Shiro sighed, his dark eyes seeming miles away.  There was a tone to his voice that made Keith remain quiet and in the shadows of the large room.

 

“That’s easy. Put him in dragon training with the others.”

 

Shiro scoffed, “Be serious.”

 

“I am.”

 

There was a pause as Shiro turned to look at the older man, “He’ll be killed.”

 

“You don’t know that.”

 

“Yes I do.”

 

“No, you don’t.”

 

“Yes, I _do_ , Coran!” Shiro huffed, “You’ve seen him; Lance is more likely to chop off his hand or someone’s head, let alone a dragon’s!”

 

“And that’s exactly why you have to give him a chance,” Coran pleaded with the Chief, “We won’t know what he’s really capable of until you let him try, and he definitely won’t stop until you do!  Even the Garretts agree that perhaps it’s time to give him a shot.”

 

Keith froze. Of course they were talking about Lance.  Who wouldn’t be, after the scene he’d caused last night with his talk of catching a Blue Fury?

 

“Besides,” Coran continued, “Don’t you think it was a little unfair of you to demand he know the exact location of that dragon?”

 

Shiro sighed again and pinched the bridge of his nose with his metal hand. “I know, but I can’t risk wasting time on another wild goose chase.  There’s already enough of that going on as it is.”

 

“You mean looking for the dragon’s nest?” the older Viking asked, “Don’t worry, Shiro, we’ll find it, and make sure those monsters pay for everything they’ve done.”

 

 _Everything_ being the kidnapping of Matt Holt four years ago.  Keith had only been thirteen at the time, but he remembered that night well.  It was the first time a dragon had ever taken a human being as its prey, and the village had instituted several changes to make sure it never happened again.  One of those changes was passing the mantle of Chief from Erik and Anya Garrett to Takashi Shirogane, as he didn’t have any small children to look after during dragon attacks.

 

“Yeah,” Shiro agreed after a pause.  He then smiled to himself, “Do you remember when Lance and Keith were little, and how they used to go off hunting for trolls when we’d take them fishing?”

 

“Trolls exist!  They steal your socks, but only the left ones.  What’s with that?”

 

Shiro laughed quietly, then his eyebrows knitted together in concern, “I worry about them.”

 

“I know,” Coran sighed, “that’s part of what makes you a good Chief.”

 

Keith took this as a perfect cue to emerge from the shadows and join the two older Vikings, and though he talked and joked and helped make plans for the village’s final trip to find the dragon’s nest before winter, Keith wasn’t really paying attention.  His thoughts swirled around what Coran and Shiro had said, their meaning playing over and over in his head.  If the Garretts, former village Chiefs and by far the most experienced vikings in judging character, thought that Lance stood a chance in the ring against dragons, he knew it was only a matter of time before that became a reality.

 

* * *

 

_Lance_

As the sun rose over the hills and washed the mountain village with light, Lance decided it was time.  He glanced at Hunk’s snoring form across the room to make sure he was still asleep, as the large viking had stayed over that night, insisting that Lance needed someone to calm him down.  Lance then swung his long legs over his bed and crept silently down the stairs, every creak and groan of the wood under his feet making him flinch, but no one in the house stirred.

 

Once he finally got down the stairs, put on his coat, and stepped outside, Lance felt a sense of anticipation.  Today was the day he’d prove himself worthy of being a true Viking.

 

_3 hours later…_

 

Lance groaned and snapped his journal shut, “The gods hate me.  Some people lose their knife in the mug, but not me!” he trudged along through the western wood, “No, I manage to lose an _entire_ dragon!” he thwacked a branch in front of him, which then thwacked him back.

 

The viking cursed silently, his eye watering.  He’d wished he had brought Hunk with him; his friend had always been good at tracking down and finding things.  He sighed and felt his stomach growl; Lance hadn’t thought to grab something to eat before sneaking out that morning and was now sorely regretting it.  He wondered if Hunk and his mom were making breakfast right now (or was it closer to lunch?) when something caught his eye.  Just to his left the trees were broken nearly in half, and below them it looked like someone had tried to go sledding in the dirt and snow.  A very big someone.  Or some _thing_ …

 

Lance held his breath as he clambered over and followed the pathway carved in the snow and earth that led to―

 

Lance gasped as he saw the dragon lying on the ground.  It was large and scaly and as blue as the midmorning sky above him.  It was wrapped in netting from head to toe.  It was the Blue Fury, and Lance had been the one to bring it down.

 

The boy hesitantly moved closer to the dragon, barely believing it.  “I―I did it,” he said, amazed, “Ohhh man―yes!  This fixes everything!” confidence and relief coursed through him as he laid a hand on the creature, “I have brought down this mighty be―agh!”

 

This last exclamation was due to the fact that said “mighty beast” began to move the moment Lance touched it.  The dragon made a wailing sound almost like a groan and rolled over to look its captor in the eye.

 

Lance backed away and stood, staring at the creature with a mixture of fear and determination.  Its yellow eyes were thin slits of danger and apprehension, and Lance had to force himself to look away.  He fumbled clumsily for the knife strapped to his belt and unsheathed it.

 

“Okay dragon,” he said, voice much shakier than he would’ve liked when addressing the creature, “I’m gonna―I’m gonna cut out your heart and take it back to Chief Shiro and the council.  I’ll prove I’m strong enough to be a Viking Paladin.” he gripped the knife in both hands and positioned himself right where the heart would be on the beast.  It shook in his hands, and Lance tried to settle himself with deep, steady breaths.  This was so different from shooting rocks from slingshots at passers-by; this felt― _personal_.  He wondered suddenly if this was what Shiro felt all the time when he’d thrust his metal arm into the belly of a dragon.

 

Lance looked from his blade to the dragon and stared into its eyes.  There was something there, some kind of rawness in the creature’s eyes, that made him hesitate.  He scrunched his eyes shut and took a deep breath, ready to plunge.

 

But then the Blue Fury made a noise and closed its eyes, as if finally accepting its fate.  As Lance watched, he glanced across the massive length of the dragon and saw how heavy it breathed, scaly skin heaving and straining against the ropes that bound it.

 

A sick feeling washed through Lance’s chest. “I did this,” he muttered softly, aghast at the pain he had inflicted.  He looked once again at the knife in his hands and made up his mind.

 

With a quick look to make sure he wasn’t being watched, Lance cut the bonds binding the dragon with his knife, moving quickly and quietly.  The moment he did so the Blue Fury sprang up and rounded on him, causing the boy to scramble backwards on all fours until he was pressed against a rock.  The dragon’s snout was right in his face, talons at his neck, and Lance could only sit petrified as it stared him down with those large yellow eyes.  He could feel the hot breath on his cheeks, the smell of fish rank in his nostrils.  His heart felt like it was going to thunder out of his chest, and nothing he could do would save it.

 

 _‘That’s it, I’m dead, I’m so dead.’_ was all that Lance could think before the dragon raised itself up, screeched in his face, and then took off, its leathery wings flapping as it tried and failed to take flight through the thick trees.

 

Lance sat for a moment and then let out the breath he’d been holding.  He stared after the dagon, picked up the knife he had dropped, and slowly stood.  He turned in a haze, took a few shaky steps, and then blacked out, the Blue Fury’s cry ringing in his ears.

 

* * *

 

When Lance finally made it home that evening, he was greeted by a sight he never thought he would see.  Chief Shiro sat at the large dining table in the middle of the room, and Lance’s mother stood across from him.  No matter how many times Lane had seen his mother in her battle armor, it never ceased to strike him how fearsome she was.  Rosa McClain was one of the best dragon fighters Arus had, and was always being asked to go on the quests to find the Dragon’s Nest.  But he didn’t understand why Shiro was _here_ , talking to her.

 

“Ah, Lance,” Shiro said once he saw the younger boy, “Perfect timing.  There’s―something your mother and I wanted to tell you.”

 

Lance glanced at his mother, uncertainty clouding his features, “I have made my feelings clear, Chief,” Rosa responded, turning from the man to her son, “And I have nothing else to add.” She walked past Lance out the door, “Be careful, _mí hijo._ ”

 

After his mother left, Shiro spoke again, “There’s something I need to say.”

 

Lance took a deep breath and thought of how he had yelled at the Chief last night, and how terrified he felt that morning staring the Blue Fury in the face, “Yeah, me too.”

 

There was a pause, then Lance spoke:

“I don’t wanna fight dragons.”

 

And Shiro at the same time said:

“I think it’s time to start fighting dragons.”

 

“ _¿Que?_ ”

 

“What?”

 

Lance cleared his throat, “Y―you go first.”

 

Shiro nodded, “Alright.  You get your wish.  You start your dragon training tomorrow.”

 

“Oh no I should’ve gone first!” Lance began to panic, “You see, I was thinking, we have a surplus of dragon-fighting Viking, but do we have enough―bread-making Vikings, or home-repair Vikings? Because I could do that!”

 

Shiro handed him a large axe that Lance nearly dropped with the weight, “You’ll need something like this.”

 

Lance took shaky breaths, “Correction, I _can’t_ kill dragons, Shiro.”

 

“But you will!” the man gave a tentative smile and patted Lance on the shoulder.

 

“No, I’m pretty sure that I won’t,” Lance tried again.

 

“Yes, you will.”

 

“Can you not hear me?” Lance followed Shiro as he started to walk to the door.

 

“Lance, this is serious,” Shiro said gravely, turning to him, “You’re joining the ranks of our finest and best up and coming fighters.  Which means you walk, talk, and think like us.  Deal?”

 

“This conversation is feeling very one-sided!”

 

“ _Deal?_ ”

 

Lance looked into the Chief’s eyes and knew there wasn’t any getting out of this, “Deal.”

 

Shiro sighed and straightened up, “Good.  Train hard.  Be great.  I’ll be back, probably.” he turned from Lance and went out the same door his mother had moments before.

  
“And I’ll be here...maybe.” Lance said in a quiet voice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I decided to try and write some parts of the story in Keith's perspective, as the switching around of characters and their dynamics changed who would be present for certain conversations. Let me know what you think, and if I should continue with it. Your feedback really means a lot to me! 
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading, it really means a lot how excited you all are, and I hope to do the movies, books, and Dawn's vision justice <3
> 
> You can always find me on tumblr, twitter, and instagram under this username, so come scream with me anytime! :3


	3. Aaaaaaaaaaaagh!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dragon training begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! Sorry for the slight delay in publication of this chapter; it ended up being WAYYY longer than I originally thought. Thank you all so much again for all the beautiful support; seeing your comments and kudos makes my day!!
> 
> Hope you enjoy!! :3

_Keith_

“Welcome to dragon training!”

 

Keith stood with the rest of the "Paladin Vikings", as they were to be called from now on, as Coran led them down to the dragon arena.  His gut twisted in anticipation and excitement when Coran lifted the portcullis, allowing them all inside the round stadium.  There was a chorus of “woah”s from the four teens as the cautiously followed their instructor.

 

“I don’t know about you guys,” Hunk said, “But I’m hoping to get some seriously cool burns.”

 

Pidge perked up, “I’m hoping for some small grazes, like on my shoulder or lower back.”

 

“Yeah,” Keith sighed, his heart starting to pound, “It’s only fun if you get a scar out of it, right?”

 

“Totally,” Lance said from behind the rest of the group, “Pain.  Love it.”

 

Pidge and Hunk shook their heads at their friend and turned back to face Coran.  Keith turned to look at Lance and took in the large axe he carried.  So Coran _had_ been serious about having him join, and Shiro had let him.  A flurry of emotions coursed through him, and he couldn’t figure out exactly which emotions they were.

 

“Alright!” Coran’s always booming voice interrupted Keith’s thoughts, “Let’s get started!  The paladin who does best in training gets the honor of killing their first dragon in front of the entire village!”

 

This, Keith had already known.  He felt as though he’d been born knowing, that _this_ was the way to find out what kind of Viking he was.

 

“Now,” Coran said, gesturing to the giant steel doors all around the large stadium, “Behind these doors are a few of the species of dragons you’ll learn to fight, some of which include the Deadly Nadder―”

 

“Super quick and clever,” Hunk muttered on Keith’s right.

 

“―the Hideous Zippleblack―”

 

“Two heads, twice the trouble.”

 

“―the Crimson Nightmare―”

 

“Fast, fiery, and hard to predict.”

 

“―the Roving Terror―”

 

“Tiny devils with wings.”

 

“Can you please stop?” Pidge elbowed the large paladin.

 

“―and,” Coran finished, walking to a door and placing his hand over the release hatch, “The Yellow Gronkle.”

 

Pidge seemed to realize a split second before the others what was happening, “Wait!  Aren’t you gonna teach us how to fight this thing first?”

 

“I believe in learning on the job,” Coran smiled as he pulled the lever to open the Gronkle’s cage.

 

The moment he did, the dragon burst out of this containment and barrelled straight for the paladins, scattering them like bowling balls.  A surge of adrenaline flooded through Keith’s system as he rolled and dodged the lumbering, uncoordinated dragon, as if his body was pushing him to move faster, think quicker, strike harder.

 

“Today is about survival!” Coran boomed across the arena as the Paladins ran about, “If you get blasted, you’re dead!”

 

Keith thought the viking sounded far too happy when he said that, but he didn’t have a lot of time to think about it as he dodged the creature crashing through the air towards him.

 

“Quick, what’s the first thing you’re going to need?”

 

“A doctor?” Lance yelled.

 

“A place to hide?” Pidge screeched.

 

“A shield!” Keith said confidently, years of Shiro’s comments kicking in with instinct.

 

“Right!” Coran agreed, “Your most important piece of equipment is your shield.  If you must choose between a sword or a shield, pick the shield!”

 

Keith immediately ran over to the rack here the weapons and equipment were kept and grabbed the large red shield.  He then ducked back as the Gronkle flew overhead and drew his sword, hefting the two pieces with ease.  He’d been wielding these weapons for what felt like forever, and their weight was a comfort in his hand.

 

As Keith watched, he saw Lance and Pidge reach for a shield at the same time.

 

“Pidge, get your hands off my shield!”

 

“There’s like a million shields!”  the small girl protested.

 

“Take that one, it has flowers on it,” Lance fired back, “Girls like flowers.”  


Pidge wrenched the wood out of Lance’s hand and smacked him over the head with it, “Oops, now this one has blood on it.” she threw the shield back at the gangly boy and cackled until the Gronkle flew overhead and blasted the glasses off her face.

 

“Pidge, you’re out!” Coran called across the arena as the girl groaned and picked up her glasses, “Another thing these shields are good for is noise!  Make lots of it to throw off a dragon’s aim.”

 

Keith began to hit the side of his shield with his sword, and Hunk and Lance quickly followed suit, banging their axes against their shields.  The dragon then began to stutter and shake its head at the noise and swooped out of the way, trying to collect itself.

 

“Also, each dragon has a limited number of shots,” Coran spoke again, “Does anyone know how many a Gronkle has?”

 

“Six?” Lance guessed.

 

“No, no, five!” Hunk corrected, stopping his clanging to turn to his friend.

 

“Right!  That’s one for each of you and then some!” Keith tried not to be too concerned at their teacher’s seeming lack of concern for their lives, even as Hunk’s shield was suddenly blown to bits by the dragon, “Hunk, that’s you!”

 

The large paladin screamed as he scrambled over to where Pidge stood.  Lance and Keith were the only two remaining as the dragon continued to lumber around, surprisingly fast for its size and unbalanced nature.  The two boys ran around, Keith trying to stay out of its range and find a weak spot, Lance trying to keep up behind him.

 

“What’s up with all the running away, Keith?” Lance taunted, huffing, “You getting _scaaaared_?”

 

That made Keith turn back to face the boy behind him, pulse pounding in his ears, “I’m not scared!”

 

Lance opened his mouth to retort when the Gronkle blasted right between them, knocking the shield out of Lance’s hand and making him run in the opposite direction after it.

 

“One shot left!”

 

Keith sprinted away from the dragon as it flew after Lance, who wasn’t paying any attention to the creature as he chased down his shield.  The damn idiot was going to get himself killed!

 

“Lance!” Hunk yelled, alerting his friend to danger.

 

Keith could only watch as Lance looked over his shoulder and tripped, crashing into the arena wall.  The Gronkle flew right up in his face, mouth open and ready to blast his head off.  Something in Keith’s chest twisted as he charged towards the dragon, when Coran appeared and yanked the dragon back right as he blasted, causing the fireball to hit the wall just above Lance’s head.

 

“And that’s five!”  Coran grunted and wrestled the creature back into its enclosure, “Go back to bed, you overgrown sausage!”

 

Once the dragon was safely put back in his cage, Coran turned to the three vikings standing around, “And finally, the most important thing to remember: a dragon will always,” he turned to Lance, who still sat where he had fallen, chest heaving, “ _always_ go for the kill.” he hefted the boy up onto his feet and led the rest of the group on to their next challenge.

 

Keith spared a look at Lance to make sure he was really okay before turning back to Coran, relief settling through his chest as he did.  He only hoped that the paladin could last the rest of the day without getting barbequed.

 

* * *

 

_Lance_

After they were finished with training for the day, Lance snuck away to the western wood, the whole time thinking about what Coran had said.  He made it to the spot where he’d freed the Blue Fury and knelt next to the cut heaps of netting.

 

“If what Coran said is true,” Lance muttered, “Why didn’t you?” he thought of the Blue Fury’s eyes boring into him as he sat, completely helpless and perfect for the killing.  But it hadn’t killed him.

 

A loud noise close by caught his attention, and he stood, following the source of it until he came to a clearing cut out of the rocks.  He barely caught a glimpse of the crystal lake below him before a large mass suddenly flew in front and above him, clawing at the rocks above.

 

Lance gasped and flinched back, recognizing the creature as it fell back down the canyon and to the grass.  It was the Blue Fury, and it was desperately trying to climb out of the clearing.  Lance watched in awe as the dragon flapped its wings, became airborne for a moment, and then crashed painfully back to the ground.  And again.  And again.

 

Finally, Lance got a hold of himself and pulled out the journal he always carried with him.  He quickly sketched out the creature and couldn’t help but marvel at its beauty.  Its large wings were long and sleek, and looking at it Lance could see how it was built for speed and aerodynamics.

 

“Why don’t you just fly away?” he murmured to himself as he finished up the sketch, correcting himself when he saw it had only half a tail fin.

 

He set down his pencil to look again at the creature when it rolled away and down into the clearing.  The pencil clattered on the rocks as it fell, and the dragon’s ears perked straight up as it turned to the source of the noise.  It followed the pencil, then glanced up at Lance, once again locking him in place with those yellow eyes.  Strangely, though, Lance didn’t think the dragon was going to attack him so much as it was irritated at Lance for interrupting.  The two of them stared at each other for a moment, dragon and boy, before the Blue Fury turned away in a huff and attacked the pond, trying to catch some fish.

 

* * *

 

Lance didn’t have much time to observe the dragon as it flew about, however, because it started to rain.  He quickly got up and headed back towards the village for dinner, where Coran had told them all to meet him at town hall, saying they’d be meeting together for dinner from now on.  The crazy viking had claimed that it encouraged “Paladin bonding” or something like that, and that with time they’d all be like a pack of Yelmore dragons, attached by the ear.  Lance didn’t mind too much, seeing as the alternative for him would’ve been scrounging up something at his house by himself.  He did mind, however, that the rain had soaked him through to the bone, and he couldn’t stop shivering.

 

When he made it to the large hall, he saw that Coran and the others were already there are mostly finished eating.  No one acknowledged Lance’s entry, except for Hunk giving a slight nod in his direction.

 

“Keith, where did you go wrong in the ring today?” Coran asked.

 

“My footwork was sloppy and uncoordinated; I need to get used to flat terrains when fighting,” the dark-haired paladin said as he picked at the bone on his plate.

 

“Yeah, we noticed,” Pide said sarcastically, rolling her eyes at Hunk.

 

“He’s completely right, number 5,” Coran interjected, “You’ve got to be hard on yourself out there.  Fighting dragons is a life-or-death situation.”

 

“What did you call me?” Pidge sat up, her hair prickling with annoyance.

 

“I’ve got you all ranked by height; it’s easier than remembering your names sometimes.”

 

“But there’s only four of us,” Hunk raised an eyebrow at the viking.

 

“Well, of course I’m the tallest, so I’m number one!” Coran argued, “Now, where did Lance go wrong today?” he asked as Lance came up to the table and sat on the other end closer to the fire to dry off.

 

“He elbowed me in the face and nearly broke my glasses?” Pidge suggested, adjusting said glasses on her head.

 

“He’s never where he should be.” Keith stated, and it took everything in Lance not to flinch at the harsh tone of his words.  He glanced over at Keith and narrowed his eyes when he saw the other staring at him, eyes dark in the torch lit room.

 

“You just wish you were as fast as me, mullet,” Lance snapped back, his cheeks warming like they always did when Keith spoke to him.

 

“Thank you, Keith,” Coran interrupted before he could reply snd the two go at it, “You need to live and breathe this stuff,” he pulled out a book and slammed it on the table, “The dragon manual.  Everything we know about every dragon we know of is in here.”

 

Thunder crashed, loud and unforgiving overhead.  The Viking looked up and nodded, “No attacks tonight.  Get reading.” he left the teens to themselves.

 

“Wait, like right now?” Pidge asked, “Coran knows I have four new inventions I’m working on, not to mention I have to completely rebuild the crossbow Lance burnt to a crisp!”

 

“Hey, it wasn’t my fault, that Crimson Nightmare came from out of nowhere!” Lance protested, shaking his finger at the small viking.  He tried to make the gesture as convincing as possible, which is a tad hard to do when you’re dripping wet.

 

“Guys, come on,” Hunk pleaded with his two companions, “Coran’s got a point; this book is soooo cool!  It tells you about all these different types of dragons and what terrain they’re found in and―”

 

“Yeah, yeah that’s cool and all,” Pidge interrupted, “But tell me about it while you pump the bellows for me; I need your big beefy arms.” she stood and grabbed the back of Hunk’s shirt, dragging him from the table and outside.

 

“Goodnight!” Hunk called over his shoulder at Keith and Lance.

 

“Bye, Hunk!” Lance called back.

 

There was a silence after the two teens left, during which Lance and Keith eyed each other, then at the leather-bound book in the middle of the table.  Lance tried not to notice the way Keith’s hair fell in his eyes and how silky smooth it looked in the torchlight.  He also tried not to notice the dark circles under the pale boy’s eyes, or to wonder if he was getting enough sleep these days.  There used to be a time where Lance could’ve simply asked how Keith was, and whether he was taking care of himself, but that time had long since passed.

 

“So, are we gonna have to take turns with this thing, or…?” Lance let the question hang as he gestured to the book.

 

Keith shook his head, “I’ve already read it.  I got everything I need in order to fight out of it.” he stood and shoved the book at Lance, “It should be able to keep you alive in the ring while the rest of us kill things.” he began to walk away.

 

Irritation prickled at Lance’s scalp, “I’ll have you know that I’m more than capable of succeeding in this Paladin training!”

 

Keith stopped and turned back to Lance, a strange look in his dark eyes.  He almost looked...hopeful...as if he wanted what Lance had said to be true.

 

“Just don’t get eaten on your way home,” Keith finally said, turning back around.

 

Lance watched him go and shook his head  Damn these torch lights making him see things not really there.  Damn Keith for always making his insides squirm.  Damn this Paladin dragon training.  Damn it all.  The paladin grabbed the leather-bound book in front of him and sniffed as he flipped it open.  Great, now he was gonna get a cold, on top of everything else.

 

He opened the book to the table of contents, where a neat, tidy scrawl greeted him, separating the dragons into 3 classifications: Strike class, Fear class, and Mystery class.

 

The last classification caught Lance’s attention specifically, and he flipped to the back of the book, beginning to read.  Accompanying the tidy writing were hand-drawn pictures depicting the size and shape of each dragon, several of which Lance had never seen or even heard of before.

 

 _‘The Thunderdrum.’_ the book said, _‘This reclusive dragon inhabits sea caves and dark tide pools.  When startled, the Thunderdrum releases a concussive sound that can kill a man at close range.  Extremely dangerous, kill on sight.’_

 

He flipped a page to the next dragon:

 

_‘Weblum.  This dragon is a massive creature with three stomachs in order to properly digest its victims and turn their remains into a material known as Scaultrite.  While this material is a delicate piece of work, there is no known practical use.  This dragon also has a paralyzing gaze.  Avoid its face at all costs.  Extremely dangerous, kill on sight.’_

 

With every turn of the page Lance could feel his horror and curiosity growing larger and larger in his chest.  Thunder crashed outside, making Lance jump.  He flipped another page:

 

_‘The Changewing.  Even newly hatched dragons can spit acid.  Kill on sight.’_

 

Lance began turning the pages more haphazardly, names and phrases jumping out at him:

 

_‘The Galra._

 

_Skrill._

 

_Quintessent._

 

_Whispering Death.’_

 

“Burns its victims, buries its victims,” Lance muttered as he continued to read, “Chokes its victims, turns its victims inside-out.”

 

 _‘Extremely dangerous.’_ Every page read, _‘Kill on sight.’_

 

He flipped to the very last entry. _‘Blue Fury.’_

 

Lance’s eyes widened at the name and stared for a moment at the page.  No pictures accompanied this dragon’s description, and even that was scarce.

 

_‘Speed unknown._

 

_Size unknown._

 

 _The unholy offspring of lightning and death.  Never engage this dragon.  Your only chance:_ **_hide and pray it does not find you_ ** _.’_

 

Lance sat back, looked around to make sure no one was watching, and pulled out his journal, flipping to his sketch of the Blue Fury he had made just that afternoon.  He laid the journal across the book and stared at the page: description with drawing, side-by-side for the first time.

  
Boy was he in trouble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: *blows a kiss bc I love you all*
> 
> also me: ARE YOU READY FOR SOME KLANGST


	4. When Yelling Doesn't Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perhaps there are angels amongst monsters after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay in updating, my loves! Life got really crazy for me this week and I wasn't able to find time to write anything. Thank you all for your patience and the love you continue to give this project; it's really what fuels me on the bad days. <3
> 
> P.S. I posted this at midnight with no beta reader, so please forgive any mistakes. I'll edit it once I have time XP

_Shiro_

Shiro closed his eyes and took a deep breath, smelling the salty seawater around him, "We're so close," he muttered, opening his eyes and turning to Erik Garrett, "I can feel it."

 

The Chief looked back out over the sea into the fog-covered islands where he knew the dragons lived.  Marmora's Gate.  It was the same fog they came from every night, and the same darkness they returned to every morning.

 

"Take us in."

 

* * *

 

_Keith_

Keith bolted upright, the Crimson Horror's screams echoing in his ears.  He sat in the dark, breathing heavily as thunder shook the side of his home.

 

_'Just a dream, a dream, it was just a dream.'_

 

His mind repeated this like a mantra, over and over again like it always did.  And, like always, his heart screamed at him the opposite, pounding and pulsing and reminding him of how alive he was.

 

One thousand and one nights he'd been having nightmares.

 

One thousand and one times they had been about Lance.

 

Lance, his arm taken off like Shiro's, lost to the belly of a beast.  Lance, carried off by a dragon and never to be seen again.  Lance, half his body ashes and the other half burnt beyond repair.

 

Keith's nightmares, ever since he could remember them, had always involved something happening to Lance, whether it be because of a dragon or because he'd gotten sick or simply because he'd been stupid.  And every time Keith would wake like this: in a state of panic and worry, having to remind himself that none of it was real, that Lance was never going to fight dragons, that he was safe.

 

Until he  _had_ started fighting dragons.

 

Now, when Keith awoke from a nightmare, he would have to discern reality from dream by remembering the obnoxious comments Lance had made the day before.  He'd remember the way Hunk or Pidge would save him at the last second by grabbing his shirt or warning him.  He'd remember the cocky smirk and the uncertain blue eyes, revealing how the boy truly felt about the whole ordeal, and it was those eyes that had made Keith beg Shiro four years ago to not let Lance join dragon training.  He could never live with himself if his best friend got killed by one of those creatures, and he wanted to make sure it wouldn't happen.  Thankfully Shiro had agreed, the council deciding it would be best to keep Lance out of training, too, and Keith felt relieved.

 

But then something happened, and Lance stopped speaking to him.  Instead of a cheery "Good morning!" Keith would be greeted with a non-comital grunt, if even that.  The friendly competition the two of them always had turned into a bitter rivalry filled with insults that half the time were actually hurtful, and Keith had no idea why.  When he'd confronted Lance about it finally, the blue-eyed boy had refused to tell him, saying that if Keith didn't know they were never really friends to begin with.  That had stung more than anything else, and the two of them haven't spoken since.  Well, outside of insults and arguments, at least.

 

But no matter what happened or what was said, Keith never stopped caring about the gangly Viking boy, and he didn't think he ever really would.

 

* * *

 

 

_Coran_

"Hey, you know, I just happened to notice the dragon book had almost nothing on Blue Furies.  Is there another book, or a sequel?  Maybe a Blue Fury pamphlet?  Agh!" Lance screeched as his axe was blasted out of his hands.

 

Coran fought the urge to groan loudly, "Focus, Lance!  You're not even trying!"  the boy had been more distracted-seeming than usual today, and Coran couldn't understand what was going on.  He watched as the Deadly Nadder chased after Lance through the hastily put-up wooden maze in the dragon arena.  "Today is all about attack!  Nadders are clever and light on their feet.  Your job is to be cleverer and lighter!"

 

The Nadder caught sight of Hunk running through the maze beside her and turned after the Paladin, snapping and blasting at him as the teen yelled.

 

"I'm really beginning to question your teaching methods!" The Nadder jumped from its perch on top of the maze as she pursued Hunk.

 

"Look for its blind spot!" Coran encouraged, "Every dragon has one.  Find it, hide in it, and strike!"

 

Keith and Lance ran around a corner and came face-to-face with the dragon, the bulbous horn in the middle of her head obscuring her view of the two of them.

 

"Ugh, did you even  _try_ to wash your hair last night?" Lance wrinkled his nose at the shorter viking in front of him, "It's more oily than Pidge's tools!"

 

"Look, I've been a bit preoccupied recently," Keith said sourly, "If you don't like it, just get your own blind spot!" he shoved back against the taller Paladin, to which Lance responded in kind.

 

"How about I give _you_ one?" Lance yelled, shoving Keith out of the blind spot, and the two only had a moment to realize their cover was blown before the Nadder struck. Coran had to really try to keep from groaning at the pair of them as they ran off in the opposite direction, the Nadder jumping atop the maze again to pursue her targets.

 

"Blind spot, yes.  Deaf spot, not so much." Coran commented as they tried to avoid the dragon's blast.

 

"Okay, okay," Lance huffed, "So then how would one sneak up on a Blue Fury?"

 

"No one's ever seen one and lived to tell the tale.  Now get in there!"

 

"I know, I know, but hypothetically…" Lance trailed off as he noticed Pidge.

 

"Lance!" the girl hissed, "get down!"

 

Coran could see that she and Hunk had spotted the Nadder a few feet away and were trying to come up with some sort of strategy.  To be honest, Coran hadn't been so sure of the girl when Shiro had told him that Pidge would be joining in the training, but after seeing what she could do in the smithy and how quickly her mind worked, Coran knew she would be a great Paladin.

 

As Lance crouched down beside the two teens, the Nadder wandered her way through the maze.  Hunk rolled across the pathways where theirs and the dragon's paths crossed, Pidge darting after him.  Lance tried to follow Hunk's lead and roll, but he didn't have enough momentum and was held fast by his shield, immediately attracting the dragon's attention.  The Nadder roared and snapped at Lance as he scrambled away, and jumped on top of the maze.  She then caught sight of Pidge and started after her, when a rock came hurtling through the air.

 

"Hey, scaly, over here!" Keith yelled and then ran away, causing the dragon to give chase.

 

The Nadder screeched and attempted to blast Keith as he sprinted through the maze and breezed past Lance, who had frozen in place once escaping the Nadder's blast.  Coran had to admire the speed and agility at which Keith was operating; he was somehow able to stay just ahead of the dragon as he ran, even causing it to crash into― and subsequently knock over―the maze walls.  The creature payed no mind, though, as she pushed over one wall and then another, a domino effect stating to occur with all the maze walls.

 

Coran could see that this could all go very sour very quickly.

 

"Has anyone ever seen a Fury napping?" Lance called up as Hunk and Pidge ran past him to the exit.

 

The Viking did a double-take.  Lance was  _seriously_ still on about this, "Lance!" he gestured to the arena falling apart.

 

Lance opened his mouth to say something else when Keith came hurtling through the air at him, "LANCE!"

 

The Paladins crashed to the ground, Keith on top of Lance, his sword jammed stuck into Lance's shield.

 

"Guys, this really isn't the time!" Hunk called out as the two boy struggled to disentangle themselves from each other.

 

Keith was somehow able to stand, but saw the Nadder coming right for them and tugged at his sword harder, even stepping on Lance's face until he relinquished his hold in the shield.  Keith then swung the sword/shield and clubbed the dragon squarely across the face, shattering the shield and sending the dragon back into her enclosure.

 

Coran breathed a sigh of relief, "Well done, Keith."

 

He watched as Keith took a deep breath to compose himself and rounded on Lance, "Is this some kind of a joke to you?" he yelled at the boy on the ground, "Our parents' war is about to become ours, Lance.  Figure out which side you're on." he gestured at Lance with his sword for emphasis, then turned away, fuming silently to himself.

 

Coran rubbed his mustache, noting the way Lance watched Keith storm away, and how flushed pink Keith's cheeks were.  He knew Keith meant well by his outburst, but he wasn't so sure Lance knew that.  He'd try and figure out what was going on between them later though; right now he needed to clean up the mess his Paladins had made.

 

* * *

 

 

_Lance_

Lance took a deep breath as he approached the cove he'd found the Blue Fury in before.  He had a shield on one arm, a knife strapped to his side, and a fish hooked in his fingers.  He held the shield up and tossed the fish onto the ground a few feet away.  After nothing happened, Lance looked up and around the cove, not seeing the Blue Fury anywhere.

 

He decided to go in and see if the dragon was even still there.  He tried to move between the two rocks with his shield, but it got stuck between them and wouldn't budge.  With a sigh, Lance ducked under the wood and into the cove, turning slowly as he walked, looking for the dragon.  Suddenly he heard a soft growling behind him, and he turned around to see the Blue Fury sitting on top of a rock, haunches raised like a lioness about to pounce on her prey, which seemed to be Lance.

 

The dragon climbed off the rock in one fluid motion, her blue scales reflecting the color of the sky as she moved towards him.  The dragon sniffed at him, and Lance picked up, then extended the fish quickly, hoping that she was more interested in the dead meat more than him. The Blue Fury began to reach her mouth out to take the fish when she retreated quickly, growling and snarling, her yellow eyes dangerous slits.

 

Lance jumped and tried to think what was wrong when he remembered the knife at his waist. He pushed back his vest so the dragon could see it, and when he reached to touch it she growled louder. Lance jumped again at the sudden threat, and quickly unsheathed the knife. He threw it on the ground, and, when that didn’t make the Blue Fury stop, nudged it with his foot and pushed it into the small lake beside him with a _plunk!_

 

The dragon cocked her hears at him, and her eyes looked less dangerous than before, almost as if she were curious.  Slowly she approached and reached out to take the fish, mouth open to reveal a pink mouth full of teeth and―

 

“Huh,” Lance muttered, “Your tongue...it’s bright blue!” he laughed, and the dragon snatched up the fish with one gulp.

 

The dragon then cocked her head at Lance again and started to advance bravely at him, "Uhhhh," he backed up until the dragon had him cornered against a rock, "I don't have any more!"

 

The Blue Fury looked at him for a moment, then made a strange swallowing noise in her throat until she regurgitated the fish's body onto Lance's lap.  Lance fought the urge to gag as she backed up and sat facing him.  The fish was cold and covered in spit, and the wetness began to soak into his trousers.  This would be a difficult thing to explain to Hunk that night.

 

After a moment, Lance realized the Blue Fury was still looking from him to the fish expectantly, and he seemed to realize what she wanted him to do. "Uh," he picked up the fish and tried not to think about how gross this would be, eying the dragon as she watched him.  

 

He raised the raw fish to his mouth and took a bite out of the animal.  He had to force himself not to immediately spit it out; the fish was cold, mushy, and completely tasteless.  He tried for a smile and held the rest of the fish out to the dragon, trying to get her to take it again.  She simply nodded her head at him, still looking expectant when he didn't swallow the fish.

 

 _'Really?'_ Lance wanted to whine, but couldn't, seeing as his mouth was full of fish.  He forced himself to swallow the food down, just barely managing to keep his gag reflex from kicking in at the last second.  He shuddered as it went down his esophagus and tried for a smile at the Blue Fury.

 

The dragon cocked her head curiously at him, and her face began to morph until it looked like…

 

"Are you…" he trailed off and sat up, inching towards the dragon, "trying to smile?"

 

He laughed gently, and then, seeing the kind look on the creature's face, tentatively reached a hand out to touch her nose.  He didn't get very close, though, before her eyes became slits again and she growled at him, turning away with a whoosh of her wings.  She tried to take flight, but once again crashed to the ground after becoming airborne for a moment.  Lance still couldn't figure out why she couldn't just fly away, and figured Pidge or Hunk would know, if they could see her.

 

 _'Figure out which side you're on.'_  Keith's words, harsh and certain, echoed in his head.  What would Keith think of the Blue Fury in front of him?  Would he think her the devilish fiend like they always talked about when they were kids?  Or would he see her as Lance did right at this moment: blue and peaceful and…beautiful?

 

The dragon walked over to a soft patch of grass and turned in circles a few times before she settled down and closed her eyes.  It reminded Lance of when a dog would spin around on its bed before going to sleep, and he couldn't help but inch over and sit right beside her, inspecting the scales of her skin.  He saw that her scales were like the ocean's: reflective of the sky and its changes, which explained how she was always able to blend in perfectly with the night sky, yet also be bright blue in the daytime.  Again Lance reached out to touch her gently, but Blue, as he was starting to call her in his head, again growled at him.  He backed right away and decided to simply let the dragon get accustomed to his presence; if she wasn't going to let him touch her, he might as well observe her for as long as he could.

 

After an hour or so of nothing exciting happening, Lance grabbed a stick and began to draw in the soft dirt around the lake in the middle of the cove.  At first he wasn't sure what he was drawing, but as he kept going he realized he was drawing Blue as she attempted to smile.  It was such a strange and yet endearing expression on the dragon that he couldn't help but grin to himself as he drew it.  Shortly, he realized that Blue had come up beside him, curiously looking at what he was doing.  He made sure to stay perfectly still where he was and pretended not to notice how close she was to him.

 

After watching him for a moment, Blue walked off and right up to a tree, ripping off a large tree branch and began dragging it through the dirt, moving and spinning and swirling around.  She paused a moment, looking at Lance, then back at the ground.  She began to move around again, creating some sort of pattern in the dirt, and Lance felt his chest warm ever so slightly when he realized she was again trying to copy him by drawing something in the dirt.

 

Lance stood and began to walk around, trying to see what kind of design Blue had created.  Suddenly Blue growled at him, and Lance realized he had stepped on a line she had made.  He watched carefully as he removed his foot, and placed it back, Blue growling when his foot touched the line.  He then stepped gently over the line and watched carefully as Blue made a pleased humming noise in the back of her throat.

 

Lance smiled at the dragon as he stepped over the lines, slowly spinning and making his way across the cove until he felt a warm, fishy breath on the back of his neck.  He froze and turned slowly around, coming face-to-face with Blue, as close as they had been when she'd been tied down by his netting.  He hesitantly stretched out a hand to touch her nose again, and she growled.  Lance looked from her snarling face to his hand, and with a deep breath closed his eyes and turned his head away, gently extending his hand towards her face.

 

Lance stood with bated breath, every cell in his body warning him how dangerous this was, closing your eyes and turning your back on a dragon, unarmed and completely vulnerable.  But he kept his hand up.  And just when Lance thought that she'd moved away or was going to turn him into fish fry, he felt a gentle nudge on his hand.

 

The dragon had let him touch her.

 

Lance let all the air he had been holding out all at once and snuck a peek at the dragon, her eyes closed and easing into his gentle touch.  She looked so much at peace, and something inside Lance seemed to fall into place.

 

_'Figure out which side you're on.'_

 

Perhaps there weren't two sides, but one.  And Lance desperately wanted to be on it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: Too much klangst & pining?
> 
> also me: there's never too much pining klangst
> 
> Thanks again to the ever perfect @parfeitperi on tumblr!


	5. Training Your Dragon, the Hard Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance makes a discovery.
> 
> Coran makes roast chicken.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, the love you all are showing for this is beautiful and I'm so thankful for you!!!!
> 
> P.S. to my HTTYD movie fans reading, the upcoming chapters are where this story starts to deviate from the original, so please don't burn me at the stake if it's not exact ;o;
> 
> As always, all my love and thanks to @parfeitperi for letting me write this!
> 
> (And a special shoutout to all who comment on every single chapter, it's like having my very own coffeehouse with regulars who like black angst and sweet brew fluff all collectively screaming. I love it so much; thank you!!)

_Hunk_

That night, the four Paladins and Coran sat around a campfire, roasting chickens and other various food items over the warm flames, which Hunk was excited about.  Slow-roasted chicken and potatoes were the best kind, and after working with Pidge all day in her smithy, he could use some well-cooked grub.

 

As they all sat around the fire and ate, Coran began regaling them with war stories that seemed so implausible they had to be true.  The crazy Viking told of his battles with the infamous Weblum dragon, and how he had taken down a wild pack of Yelmores, dragons attached by the ears and lethally in-sync.

 

“Wow,” Hunk was impressed, “And you took them down all by yourself?”

 

“Not completely,” Coran ran a hand through his large orange mustache, “Before he became Chief, Shiro went with me on several adventures.  Surely you’ve heard some of the stories?”

 

All of the Paladins nodded.  Hunk had grown up hearing the stories of Takashi Shirogane, the boy destined to become Chief, if he should wish it.  Even though Hunk was the son of the Chief at the time, it had been determined that Shiro would make the next best choice if something were to happen.

 

“One story I haven’t heard, though,” Pidge spoke up suddenly, “Is how exactly Shiro lost his arm.”

 

Hunk saw Keith visibly flinch to his left, and Lance’s body went rigid beside him.

 

“Well,” Coran looked uneasily around at the four teens, “As you know, it happened the same night Matt Holt was killed by the dragons―”

 

“Taken.” Pidge interrupted, “He wasn’t eaten or killed.  He was taken.”

 

The sudden fire in the girl’s voice was so intense, Hunk wondered how he hadn’t noticed before how much her brother’s abduction still meant to her.

 

“Right,” Coran amended, “Taken.  My apologies, number five.”  He took a deep breath and continued, “Matt Holt was taken by the dragons, but not before he and Shiro put up quite a fight against a Whispering Death.  It’s rumoured that the two of them wore the dragon down to its final shot, and in an act of desperation the creature lunged out for Matt, its jaws wide and ready to gobble him whole when Shiro threw himself into its path.  Instead of Matt, the dragon had gotten the whole of Shiro’s arm in its jaws, including a sword to the back of the throat.  

 

“The dragon died instantly, but the damage had been done.  With that one clash of teeth, Shiro had lost his arm.  Matt was just able to drag Shiro to some help before another dragon swooped out of nowhere and snatched him up.  He’s not been heard from since.”

 

There was silence all around the fire as the teenagers comprehended what Coran had told them.  Hunk felt sick to his stomach, and really hoped that his eaten chicken wouldn’t make another appearance.

 

“When I was younger,” Keith broke the uneasy silence, “I vowed that I’d cut off the right arm of every dragon I met in retaliation for that offense.”

 

Hunk felt a sort of shock creep along his spine.  He knew Keith was aggressive and a bit detached, but that seemed cold, even for him.

 

“I remember,” Lance muttered, barely audible over the crackling of the fire.  If Hunk hadn’t seen his friend’s lips move, he almost would’ve thought he imagined it.

 

“I realize how childish of me that was now, though,” Keith continued, “It doesn’t do any good to make amputees of dragons.”

 

“Nope, you want to aim at the wings and the tails,” Coran munched on his chicken, “If it can’t fly, it can’t get away.  A downed dragon is a dead dragon.”

 

Hunk felt Lance tense up beside him again, and when he looked over at his friend Lance’s blue eyes were far and away from the small campfire.  Hunk nudged the boy with his shoulder, “Dude.  You okay?”

 

Lance came back to reality, though his eyes still looked a little misty, “What?  Yeah, I’m fine.  Just tired.”

 

“You should go rest, then,” Coran said, “tomorrow’s another big day, as we slowly but surely work our way up the ranks of the dragons until we reach the Crimson Nightmare.  But who will have the honor of killing it?”

 

Hunk looked around at the three other teens seated around the campfire with him and felt that at this moment it was fairly obvious.  Keith was the best qualified and the most skilled out of all of them, and to think otherwise was folly.  But as he looked over at Lance, there was something in his eyes, some sort of spark he hadn’t seen in a long time, and Hunk thought that maybe, just maybe, Keith had a thing or two coming.

* * *

 

_Pidge_

Pidge had just fallen asleep when Lance came banging on her door.

 

She shot awake and immediately groaned; she’d fallen asleep at her desk for the third time that night.  She knew she should’ve just headed home and gone to bed, but with all the dragon training every day and the mandatory meals together at night, she was sorely behind on all her projects and needed to get at least some of them done before Shiro and the others returned.

 

 _If_ they returned at all.

 

Pidge shook her head; she needed to stop thinking like that.  Also, Lance had begun his banging again on the door to her workshop.

 

“Pidge!  C’mon, I know you never sleep!  I could really use your help with something.”

 

The girl groaned again and padded her way slowly to the door, opening it to reveal Lance.  There was a sort of wild look in his eyes as he held a large leather-bound journal in his hands.  She had seen this journal before and knew that Lance kept it as a sort of sketchbook and collection of research notes his father told him to jot down, so she didn’t quite understand why he was shoving it in her face.

 

“What do you want, Lance?”

 

“I want you to build something for me, but I need you to keep it secret.”

 

Pidge cleared out her ears, “I’m sorry, did you just say _build something_?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Pidge gave the boy in front of her a long, hard look. “What kind of something are we talking about?”

 

“Um,” Lance began to fidget, “that’s where the ‘secret’ bit comes into it.”

 

“Is it dangerous?”

 

“Probably.”

 

“Is it illegal?”

 

“In a respect.”

 

“Would it get us in trouble if someone found out?”

 

“Most definitely.”

 

Pidge thought for a moment.  The last time he had come to her with a design for an invention had been a board game that involved a lot of little pieces that moved around, claiming property and making money off of the other players until everyone goes bankrupt.  It involved a jail and four hours of her life she’d never get back.

 

“Show me the designs.”

 

Lance’s smile was so bright Pidge almost felt the need to squint, “You’re the best, Pidge!”

 

“Don’t thank me until it’s done, peabrain,” she scoffed and let him into her workshop, closing the door behind him.

 

Lance went straight up to the desk and laid out a set of sketches on the wood.  Pidge hummed as she looked at the designs and measurement notes Lance had scribbled in the margins.

 

“Can I ask what this is for?  Or do I want to know?”

 

Lance shook his head, “If all goes well, you’ll find out soon enough.”

 

“And if not?”

 

The gangly boy shrugged, “We never speak of it again.”

 

Pidge nodded.

 

“So, how long do you think it’ll take to make?”

 

The girl looked from the sketches to Lance, “If we do it right, it’ll be finished before morning.”

* * *

 

_Lance_

“Hey, Blue girl!” Lance creeped into the cove, a basket of fish on his back and a bundle under his arm, “I’ve got something for you!”

 

He spotted the dragon almost immediately as she crawled from a tree up near him.  She snorted and sniffed, seeming to realize what he had in the basket.  He lowered the woven container to the ground and pushed it over so all the dead water creatures spilled out on the ground.

 

Blue growled appreciatively and approached the piles of fish, “I got you some salmon, icelandic cod, and I even found an eel for you!”

 

Blue suddenly sniffed and backed away, eyes wide in fear, staring at something in the pile.  Lance immediately went to see what was wrong and saw that her gaze was trained on the black and yellow eel nestled amongst the fish.  He picked it out and held it up for her to see, and the dragon screamed, backing away quickly.

 

“Oh no, no, no!” Lance quickly threw the eel far away, “It’s okay, you’re okay!”

 

As soon as the eel was a good 15 feet away, Blue relaxed a bit and turned to Lance.

 

“Yeah,” he said to the dragon, wiping the slime from the eel on his shirt, “I never cared for eel, either.”  He smiled at the dragon as she again approached the piles of fish, this time digging in emphatically, small noises of chewing and swallowing accompanying it.

 

“Okay, so while you’re doing that I’m just going to go back here,” Lance said quietly, moving behind the dragon, the bundle of leather tucked under his arms, “minding my own business…” he came to the end of her tail, where one fin was missing.  

 

When Coran had said last night to go after the tails and wings of dragons, Lance had known immediately that the reason Blue couldn’t fly was because she had lost her tail fin when he had hit her with the crossbow.  Guilt had flooded him immediately, remembering how much the dragon had been struggling to fly, and how it was his fault she couldn’t anymore.  But an opportunity also came with this realization: now that he knew what the cause of the problem was, he could solve it.

 

Lance knelt down beside Blue’s tail and unrolled the bundle next to it.  He then took the buckles on the top and bottom of the bundle and strapped them to the tips of her tail, having to climb on top of it to keep her tail still while he did so.  Once he had it buckled, Lance sat up to admire his invention:

 

It was a perfectly symmetrical match of Blue’s tail fin, down to the size and shape of the leather canvas.

 

“Not bad,” Lance smiled, “We’ll have to make a few adjustments so it’ll be a little more rigid, but―”

 

Suddenly Lance lurched forward, and he held onto Blue’s tail for dear life as he and the dragon left the ground.  Lance screamed and quickly realized that BLue would crash just like she had been if he didn’t pull the tail fin tight, so he did.  Immediately they became airborne and were soaring through the air.

 

“It’s working!” Lance screeched, breathless and shaking, “Oh quiznack it’s actually working!” he twisted the fin to the right, and just like that they were gliding back towards the cove.

 

They flew for a moment, Lance still gasping as the adrenaline coursed through his veins.

 

“Yes, I did it!” Lance felt like he could go on like this forever, the wind in his hair, the ground racing below him―

 

And that was when Blue flicked him off of her tail.

 

Lance screamed as he was thrown through the air and landed with a loud _floosh_ in the large lake at the center of the cove.  Blue crashed in the water shortly after him, as he swam to the surface and gasped for air, freezing cold, teeth chattering, and body shaking, but happier than he had ever felt in his life.

 

“Yes!” he yelled, “Blue, you’re gonna fly again, I promise!”

 

The dragon made a pleased squeal and swam over to Lance, swirling her long body gracefully and effortlessly through the water.  She bobbed her head up beside him, and seeing his face, tried for the smile she had made before.  And it was in this moment, treading water in the frigid water with a dragon smiling at him, that he felt that sense of something falling into place inside him.  And it was wonderful.

* * *

 

_Keith_

“Today is about teamwork!” Coran shouted as he released the hatch on another dragon’s enclosure.  Immediately thick smoke engulfed the four teens, obscuring their vision. “A wet dragon head can’t light its fire, but the Hideous Zippleblack is extra tricky.  One head breathes the gas, and the other head lights it.  Your job is to figure out which is which.”

 

Keith stood back-to-back with Lance as the two of them held large wooden buckets filled to the brim with water.  The object, as Coran had stated earlier, was to pour the water on the dragon head that emitted sparks.  Seemed simple enough.

 

It looked, though, as if someone had thought the same about Lance, because he was dripping wet when he came to training, and refused to say anything of it.

 

“Question,” Pidge called through the fog, “If Lance and Keith start arguing, who should I throw water on first?”

 

The girl snickered as Hunk let out an exasperated, “Piiiidge!”

 

Keith spun around, clutching his bucket close to his chest.  He could barely see anything, and the only sounds he could hear were the footsteps of the other Paladins and a low rattling noise he knew came from the dragon, hidden in the black.  The suspense resonated through his bones and thrummed in his spine, and every time Lance would bump into him as they spun around, the nerves on his skin would scream.

 

“If that dragon,” Lance muttered, “shows either of its faces, it won’t know what hit him.”

 

Keith couldn’t help but snort, “Just like you didn’t know what hit you this morning when you got soaked?”

 

He could feel the heat of Lance’s glare better than see it, “Just because you’re not a dragon doesn’t mean I won’t throw this bucket over you.”

 

“I’d like to see you try.”

 

Lance spun around to face him, and Keith couldn’t help but do the same, “You know what, Kogane―”

 

He was interrupted, however, by a cry from Hunk somewhere in the smoke, “Aaah!” there was the sound of splashing water.

 

“Huuuuunk, that was me!” Pidge yelled from the same direction.

 

“Sorry!  You looked like a dragon for a second!”

 

“How in Odin’s name do I―woah!” there was the sound of wood clattering on the stones.

 

Keith and Lance immediately stood back-to-back again, tensed and ready for whatever came next.  The sounds of the dragon growling and Pidge and Hunk’s shouts were magnified in the loss of sight, and Keith was grateful for the grounding presence of Lance’s back pressed against his.

 

Without a warning Pidge and Hunk came shooting out of the black, kicking and yelling.  The sudden action dispersed some of the gas around them, and a black, scaly face came leering through it right at Keith’s own.  On pure instinct Keith threw the bucket of water in front of him, soaking the creature’s head in the cold water.  The dragon head seemed to laugh at him as its mouth and nostrils filled with more of the thick gas.

 

“Oh,” Keith muttered, “Wrong head.”

 

The dragon smiled with its teeth and snapped at him, forcing the Paladin backwards and stumbling over Lance behind him.  The two boys stumbled backwards as the second head slithered out in the open, sparks crackling and popping behind its teeth.  Lance held his bucket up above his head as the two heads bobbed up and down.

 

“Now, Lance!” Coran yelled.

 

Lance chucked the water in his bucket as hard as he could at the sparking head and just barely missed the dragon as both heads laughed at him.

 

“Oh, come on,” Lance whined.

 

The dragon then snapped at the two boys again, making Keith jump backwards and trip over a discarded bucket as Lance stood frozen.  The Zippleblack reared both of its heads to strike.

 

“Lance!” Keith heard himself yell, when suddenly the dragon’s four eyes widened in fear and backed up from the Paladin.

 

“Get back!” Lance called, throwing his hands out towards the dragon, “Back, back, back!” with every word Lance took another step, and the dragon recoiled from him, “Now don’t make me tell you again!  That’s right.”

 

Keith couldn’t believe what he was seeing.  His brain kept telling him that there must be something he’s missing.  This dragon, this fully-grown _two-headed dragon_ , was cowering before Lance like a sheep as he pushed it back to its enclosure.

 

“Back into your cage!” he paused and flourished his hand at the dragon dismissively, “Now think about what you’ve done.”

 

The boy stood back as the gate to the Zippleblack’s cage closed and turned to face the rest of the group.  All of them stared at him in shock.

 

“Okay!” Lance said, clapping his hands together, “So, are we done here?  Because I have some things I need to...yeah…” he turned and walked out of the arena, “See you all tomorrow!”

 

Nobody moved.  Nobody spoke.  Keith wasn’t sure if anyone _breathed_ as they all watched Lance walk out and away from all of them.

 

Pidge found her voice first. “What the quiznack?”

 

“Pidge!” Hunk yelled.

 

“It seems Lance just took down the Zippleblack single-handedly,” Coran mused, his mustache still a bit frazzled.

 

“No shit, Sherlock.”

 

“Pidge!”

 

Keith still sat where he’d fallen, shocked and very confused.  How had Lance done that?  Was it going to happen again?  Or was that sheer dumb luck?

  
He had no idea, but he had a feeling that he’d find out eventually.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: Okay, I'm only going to write this chapter from Lance's perspective because it makes the most sense
> 
> also me: *writes from four different perspectives at once*
> 
> me: *stares into the camera like the Office*


	6. Fear, Vanity, Revenge, and Silly Jokes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance is scared.  
> Keith is angry.  
> Pidge is smart.  
> Hunk is a ray of sunshine.  
> Shiro is panicking elsewhere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buckle up. The klangst is strong with this one.
> 
> As usual, thank you so much for your support! This is kinda a filler/prep chapter for the most-anticipated bit of the story *cough* KLANCE FLIGHT *cough* and is short in comparison with the others, so I hope you enjoy!! :3

_Lance_

The next two weeks passed in a bit of a blur for Lance, as he felt he was always running from one thing to the next, but there were two things he knew for certain:

 

  1. He was doing really well in dragon training
  2. It was all because of Blue



 

Every day since making Blue’s tail fin, Lance would go to see her in her cove and work on a way to get her back up in the air.  He’d sewn together a saddle that was waterproof and perfectly shaped to her back, made himself a harness that connected to the saddle so he wouldn’t fly off on a sudden turn (he’d found out the hard way how necessary it was), and figured out that the adjustments of her fin to make the turns came best from his foot.  Every time he’d realize an adjustment needed to be made he’d draw up designs and bring them to Pidge, doing his best to give her the bare minimum of information she required in order to help adjust and make the parts needed.  She never asked questions, though Lance could tell she was dying to, and was thankful she didn’t; he wouldn’t have been able to answer her truthfully, and he hated lying.

 

Lance also discovered something new about dragons every day he was with Blue.  He found there was a specific kind of grass that made any and every dragon stop what they were doing and revel in being rubbed by the soft material when he and Blue had crashed into it.  While he had been giving Blue a back rub, he discovered that, just like humans, dragons had a pressure point just under their jaw, and if you scratched it just right, they’d crumple like putty to the ground.  Dragons also liked shiny things, Lance found, when Blue had become distracted by the glimmer of light reflected from his shield on the ground and tried to attack it.

 

With each new discovery, Lance would test it the next day in Paladin training, and quickly people started to call him the “dragon whisperer”, because without weapon or show of force, he’d managed to take down every single dragon he’d fought in the ring within seconds of getting near them.

 

Unfortunately, this sudden development and progress in his skills made it very hard for Lance to see Blue.  He still managed to somehow get away, but it was becoming more and more difficult to steal away without anyone’s notice.  Not to mention the amount of questions he was getting from Hunk, Pidge, and Coran on how he was able to take down each dragon, and every time they did he felt guilty about keeping Blue a secret, especially from Hunk, who had been his best friend since they were both in diapers. But he knew that he couldn’t tell anyone about Blue; if one thing becoming good at dragon training had shown Lance, it was that all of the Vikings on the island wanted nothing more than to kill dragons and wipe them from existence.  If they knew that he was harboring a dragon and learning to fly on one, it would all be over.

 

* * *

 

_Keith_

Keith was pissed.

 

Every day for the past two weeks in dragon-training, he’d had his ass handed to him.  And every time it was by _Lance,_ of all people!  Ever since they had faced the Zippleblack for the first time, Lance had been taking down each dragon they came up against within minutes, and each time it was in the strangest way.  

 

But the thing that pissed Keith off the most was that it didn’t even seem like Lance _wanted_ to be any good at it, like he wasn’t even _trying_ and didn’t care that he was becoming the best in their class.  It didn’t matter how many times Keith watched or what Lance did, the moment the blue Paladin got in a dragon’s sight it would just stop, or fall over, or forget he even existed, and it was driving Keith up a wall.

 

And, usually, when something bothered Keith like this, he’d take his axe to the western wood and throw it at trees to get his anger out.

 

Needless to say, this was a regular practice for him.

 

As he threw his axe at the trees and ran through the woods, Keith could hear Shiro shouting instruction at him in his head.  His brother was constantly encouraging him to be a better, faster, strong Viking, and he knew why.  If something happened to Shiro, he wanted Keith to become the next Chief of Arus and take up the mantle of protecting the villagers from dragons.

 

He tried not to think about that too much, as both the thought of losing Shiro and being the leader of anything terrified him to no end.  He remembered telling Lance about it after Shiro had mentioned it, and how it was one of the few things they hadn’t laughed over.  He remembered the way Lance had nodded and replied with an encouraging smile and reassuring words.  He remembered how that smile had made Keith feel like he was at the top of a mountain: he was king of it all and nothing could tamper his joy, yet with one small misstep he could lose everything.

 

It was then Keith realized he liked Lance more than just as his best friend.  It was the next night he started having nightmares.  It was that week he begged Shiro to not let Lance into dragon-training.  And it was that month Lance stopped being his friend.

 

The memory of how much it stung to not have Lance to talk to made Keith instantly angry again.  For three years he’d had to do without Lance’s company, his friendship, his beautiful smiles.  For three years Keith thought he’d been doing the right thing in keeping Lance as far from danger as possible.  And now, out of nowhere, Lance decides to actually start being good at dragon-fighting?   _Now_ , when Keith had finally started to believe that he’d drop the nonsense and realize he was made for better things?   _Now_ , when Keith actually―

 

He hefted his axe to chuck it with a yell when he came face-to-face with Lance himself.  Keith was just able to keep the axe from flying out of his grip as the other Paladin froze and turned away quickly.  He was carrying something big, long, and lumpy, and it seemed as though he was trying to hide it.

 

Before Keith could question him, Lance had already ducked away where he couldn’t see him.  He tried to follow, but found he had no idea which direction Lance had gone.

 

“Lance?” he called out.  What was he doing here, in the middle of the woods?  Then again, Keith was one to talk as he looked at the axe in his hand.  He shook his head and finished his session, but couldn’t quite shake the feeling that something was off.

 

That instinct only became stronger as right after Paladin training the next day Keith tried to corner him, but he ran off and disappeared.  It occurred to Keith that during the past two weeks he hadn’t seen Lance at all during the hours between training and dinner, though he wasn’t sure how he hadn’t noticed before.  Lance was almost always hanging off of Hunk’s arm, or talking Pidge’s ear off as she worked on her inventions, or sometimes, Keith had found him sitting at the docks, looking out over the water and into the distance.  It was strange not to see him around the village, but he couldn’t blame the boy for trying to escape, since he was always swarmed with people now.  Yet something still felt off.

 

“I think what you’re feeling is called jealousy.” Pidge told Keith when he asked her about it later that day.

 

“Pidge, I know what jealousy feels like.  This isn’t it.”

 

“Suuuure,” she rolled her eyes.

 

“I’m telling you, Lance has been acting super weird lately!  Haven’t you noticed how he always runs off right after dragon training is over and doesn’t show up again until dinnertime?”

 

“Uh, yeah,” the girl took off her glasses and inspected a drawing on her table, “probably because he doesn’t want to be surrounded by all those people begging him for tips and tricks and secrets.  I mean, who’d want that?  People all in your face all the time?” she shuddered.

 

“Lance would.”

 

Pidge looked at him and squinted, “You’re super blurry so I can’t see your face, but i’m assuming you’re serious.”

 

“Of course I am!” Keith shook his hands, “Have you _seen_ Lance?  He’s always begging for attention, making jokes or talking big, like he’s the best thing since sliced bread!”

 

Pidge shook her head and turned back to inspecting her paper, “You’re an idiot, Keith Kogane.”

 

“What?”

 

“I said you’re an idiot.  Did it ever occur to you that, perhaps, Lance only says things like that because he wants you to think he doesn’t care what other people think?  Because he cares, Keith.  He cares a lot, especially where you’re concerned.”

 

That made Keith stop for a moment. “What do you mean?”

 

“I mean the Viking cares what you think about him, even after you broke his heart, stupid.”

 

“I―what?”

 

“Oh, come on, even _I_ know what happened and I was told by Hunk forever ago!”

 

“No, seriously,” Keith’s mind was whirling, “what do you mean I broke his heart?”

 

Pidge put her glasses back on, squinted at his face, then took them back off, “Nope.  That’s something you have to talk to Lance about.  I’ve been trying to stay out of _that_ drama for three years and have been doing pretty well, thank you!”

 

“I―” Keith was about to make another comment when Hunk suddenly burst through the shop door.

 

“Hey, Pidge,” the lumbering boy said as he hung his coat on a hook on the wall, as bright and sunny as ever.

 

“Other hook, Hunk,” Pidge called, not even turning to look at him.

 

“Right,” Hunk moved his coat over, and seemed to notice Keith for the first time, “Oh, hi Keith.”

 

“Hey Hunk,” Keith nodded at the newcomer, then glared at Pidge again, trying to figure out what she had meant.

 

“Am I interrupting?” Hunk asked awkwardly after a moment.

 

Keith blinked, “Oh, no, big guy, you’re good.  I was just getting ready to head out.”

 

“Good,” Pidge sighed, “I can’t deal with much more of your emo-ness if I’m going to get anything done around here.”

 

He couldn’t help but snort at that and rolled his eyes where Hunk could see him, “I feel so loved.”

 

She waved her hand absent-mindedly at him, “Just get going before I’m tempted to use you as my test subject.”

 

Keith stood to grab his coat as Hunk approached Pidge, “What’re you working on, anyway?”

 

“Just something Lance dropped off.  I’ve no idea what it is, but I have a feeling it’s going to waste more of my time than that awful game he made us play.”

 

This caught Keith’s attention.  He knew Lance drew, but he’d never seen any of his artwork, even when they were kids.

 

Hunk hummed, “It’s more delicate and intricate than anything I’ve ever seen him design.  But it’s almost like there’s a piece missing, almost―”

 

“Like he’s only giving me part of the full design, yeah I’ve realized that,” Pidge interrupted, not unkindly, and pushed the paper to the side, “But I have more important things to worry about right now, so let’s get started!” she jumped up from her desk, “To the bellows, my good fellow!  See you, Keith!”

 

Hunk groaned, “Again?  Don’t you have other things I could do?”

 

The two of them disappeared around the corner to the other half of their workshop, which Keith knew was filled of half-finished projects and untested devices.  He shucked on his coat when finally, his curiosity got the better of him.  He walked over to Pidge’s desk and looked at Lance’s designs.  They were beautifully drawn, with exact measurements and scribbled notes in the margins, and he couldn’t help but smile at the fervent lettering.  He felt it represented Lance well: erratic and quick, yet precise.

 

After a moment of admiring, Keith flipped the page over to see that the other side had art on it too, except this side looked like a map of the village and surrounding woods.  He inspected it and saw that in the western wood there was drawn a cluster of rocks and a lake.  At first he was confused with this, since he’d never seen a cluster of rocks, or a lake like that in the western wood, but he realized Lance must have discovered it.  He immediately wondered if that’s where Lance disappeared to every day, this secret cove with a lake for some peace and quiet to draw and get away.

 

Keith wasn’t sure how this discovery made him feel, but he decided he’d go and check this cove out for himself.

 

* * *

 

_Pidge_

That night Lance showed up at Pidge’s door, and as always she answered it.  But instead of being half-asleep, tonight Pidge was wide awake.  She’d been waiting on Lance to show up ever since dinner, and quickly pulled him inside the shop.

 

“Woah, Pidge, what―”

 

“I’m not making any more adjustments to your secret machine until you tell me what it is.”

 

Lance stood in the middle of her shop, his ever expressive face betraying all the thoughts going through his head.  After a moment of pursed lips and furrowing brows, he sighed.

 

“You have to swear not to tell anyone.”

 

Pidge put her hand over her heart, “Scout’s honor.” she smirked.

 

“No Pidge, I’m serious.  You can’t tell _anyone_ , not even Hunk.”

 

She paused and studied Lance’s face.  He was completely serious, all traces of the impish jokester gone from his features.  He really meant this.  She straightened and nodded, “I promise.”

 

“Good.” he took a deep breath, steeling himself, “I’m learning how to train a dragon.”

 

Pidge stared at him a moment. “What?”

 

“I said―”

 

“No, I know what you said,” Pidge put a hand to her head, trying to process, “I’m just  not quite understanding.  When you say _‘training a dragon’_...”

 

“Well,” Lance scratched the back of his head, “You know how I said I took down that Blue Fury a couple weeks ago?”

 

“Yeah, and Shiro wouldn’t let anyone go out and look for it because it was pointless.”

 

“Well I found it.  Her.  The dragon.  She was completely trapped from one hit of your invention, and I was ready to go for the kill when―” he trailed off.

 

Pidge was rooted to the spot, staring at Lance, “When…?” she gestured for him to continue.

 

Lance bit his lip, “She somehow got loose,” he started to pace a bit, “Anyway, after we started Paladin training, I found her again and decided to see if I could learn more about her when I sorta kinda ended up bonding with her?”

 

She arched an eyebrow at him, “What do you mean _sorta kinda_?”

 

“She let’s me ride on her back and I feed her fish.”

 

Her brow arched higher, “You keep referring to this dragon as a _‘she’_.  How can you tell?”

 

Lance waved his hand, “ _Yo no se,_ there’s just the sense that she’s a girl, you know?”

 

“Lance, you thought I was a boy when we were kids.”

 

“That’s different!” he protested, “Blue has these motherly tendencies that―”

 

“Blue?”

 

“Yeah, that’s what I named her.”

 

“Lance,” Pidge pinched the bridge of her nose, “You can’t name it!  Once you name it, you start getting attached to it!”

 

“Well I think that’s a little late, concerning how I plan to fly with her across the island tomorrow.”

 

“How does that even work?”

 

“She’s missing a tail fin and couldn’t fly, so I decided to use the same kind of tech you created for Shiro’s arm to make her an artificial fin, but I knew I couldn’t make all the fine mechanisms myself, so I asked you to help me.”

 

Pidge wasn’t sure her eyebrows were on her head anymore they were arched so high, “I’ve been helping you get a downed dragon _airborne_?!  After everything they’ve done, Lance―”

 

“Pidge, you don’t understand!” he pleaded with her, “Dragons aren’t awful creatures we should be afraid of, they’re really quite gentle and peaceful creatures who―”

 

“They took my brother, Lance.  Dragons took my brother away from me.  And you―you just expect me to be okay with you helping one of them?” Pidge spluttered.

 

“Don’t you think that mabe dragons only try to kill us because we tried to kill them first?”

 

For once Pidge was at a loss for words.  She hadn’t thought of it like that.  “Okay, you have a point there, but,” she wrung her hands, “the fact still remains what you’re doing is dangerous, and probably illegal!  Your dragon could eat you, or burn you into a bunch of ashes, and no one would be the wiser.  Who’s to say once you get this Blue Fury on its feet again it won’t instantly turn on you?”

 

Lance paused a moment, “No one, I guess.”

 

“But then―”

 

“Look, Pidge,” he interrupted, “the thing is, I’ve realized that nothing is how I’ve always thought it was: dragons aren’t bloodthirsty killers, I’ll never be a dragon-killer, and Keith will never see me as anything but pathetic.  I’ve made my bed, now I’m going to lie in it.” He sighed and closed his eyes, “I just came by tonight to drop this off anyway,” he pulled out a small parcel and placed it on her desk, “As a thank you for helping me.  I hope they fit.” he turned to leave.

 

Pidge found her voice as he opened the door, “Y’know, I think you should talk to Keith.  Not about the dragon, exactly, but in general.  There’s a lot of…” she flapped her hands, “whatever it is you two have, and it needs to be addressed.  Probably before you or him face that Crimson Nightmare at the end of the week.”

 

Lance didn’t turn back as he replied quietly, “There’s nothing for either of us to say.  He’s made it clear how he feels about me, and nothing I can do will change that.” He slammed the door behind him as he left.

 

 _‘Idiots,’_ Pidge thought, _‘both of them.  They’re absolute idiots.’_

 

She opened the parcel Lance had brought and gasped softly.  It was a pair of hand-knitted wool socks, dyed green to match her tunic.  She had mentioned forever ago that she wanted a new pair of warm socks for this winter, but she didn’t realize Lance had remembered.  Something tugged at the back of Pidge’s eyes, and she realized that she was crying.  The only other person to make something like this for her had been when her brother had made her the gloves she wore when working in the forge.

  
Pidge wiped her eyes and folded the socks gently on the table.  Maybe Lance could be right about dragons, maybe not.  But she did know that she’d keep his secret; something this big couldn’t stay hidden for much longer, and it was only a matter of time before it all came to light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Mike Wazowski voice*: PUT THAT THING BACK WHERE IT CAME FROM, OR SO HELP ME
> 
> P.S. as I plan out the next chapters/conclusion to what would be the first movie, would you all prefer I continue adding on chapters to this work, or create another separate work for the "2nd movie" and make them a series? Feedback appreciated and encouraged!!! Thanks


	7. Freya'sday Eve on Hysteria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Defeat, triumph, and after-parties

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going to be a long chapter. I'm not sorry :3

_Shiro_

Dawn had barely crested over the endless expanse of the sea when Shiro saw the familiar skyline of Arus.  Home.

 

Soon after spotting the shore, Shiro heard the horn that signalled their return.  He at once felt happiness and dread; the entire village would wake, and he would have nothing for them.  Nothing except half-sunken boats and half-sunken hopes.

 

When the boat pulled into the dock Shiro immediately shouldered his pack and stepped off the boat.  Keith and Coran were there to greet him, along with half of the village.  He couldn’t bear to see all of their faces, filled with hope and concern; he didn’t deserve either from them.

 

“I trust you found the nest, at least?” Coran asked as Shiro walked up past him and Keith up the dock.

 

“Not even close.”

 

“Oh,” Coran took the pack from him and shouldered it, “Excellent.”

 

The Chief sighed and turned to Keith, “I hope you had more success than me, then?”

 

It was apparently the wrong question to ask, though, because Keith pursed his lips and wouldn’t look at him, “More or less.”

 

“More ‘more’ or more ‘less’?” Shiro pressed, but that only served to make Keith withdraw even further into himself.

 

“I’ll let Coran be the judge of that.”

 

Shiro was taken aback; he was used to his brother’s brooding nature, but it wasn’t usually this poignant.  He turned to Coran, an eyebrow raised.

 

“Keith has been doing excellent in the Paladin training!” the older Viking obliged Shiro’s curious looks, “In fact, he’s at the top of the class and is going to compete tomorrow for the final showdown to decide who kills the Nightmare we captured a few days ago!”

 

“Compete?” Shiro was confused, “I thought Old Wrinkly usually picked the winner within 10 sessions.”

 

“Well, yes, our Elder has chosen that quickly in the past,” Coran continued, “But we had a sort of...late bloomer within the Paladins.”

 

“What?” Shiro had to keep himself from stopping, “Who?  Not Pidge.”

 

Coran laughed, “No, not small number 5.  Lance.”

 

Shiro _did_ stop at that.  “Lance.  As in Lance McClain, the Viking who would sooner chop off his hand than a dragon’s.   _That_ Lance?”

 

“The very same!” Coran’ mustache fluffed with pride, “Who’d have thought, right?  But he has this _way_ with the beasts!  I can’t make head or tails of it, but he’d gotten so good at it that his and Keith’s scores are tied for first!  The village is throwing a party tonight in their honor.”

 

Shiro, bewildered, looked over at his brother, and Keith’s furrowed brow was all the answer he needed.  So Lance _did_ have some hidden potential inside him, after all. “Where is he now?”

 

“Disappeared,” Keith grumbled, “At least, he’d not in the village much except for training and meals.”

 

“You can’t blame him, though,” Coran interjected, “Anytime he is here, he’s swarmed by his new fans asking for tips and tricks.”

 

“I guess anything’s possible,” Shiro shook his head, “I’ll make sure and let his mother know as soon as I can; she was concerned about him joining in the first place.”

 

* * *

 

_Lance_

Lance awoke to the sound of the signal horn.

 

 _‘They’re back.’_ He sat up and rubbed his eyes, _‘I have to go now, before_ mí mamá _gets here.’_

 

Lance swung his legs off the bed and scrambled to her dressed and gather his things.  Today was the day.  The day he and Blue would fly.  Well, technically Blue would be the one really doing all the work, but that was all in the details.

 

The Paladin ran around the house, cleaning up and getting ready for the day.  He felt bad about not being there to greet his mother when she returned, but it wouldn’t be the first time he had been out exploring when she got back.  Once he was done, Lance grabbed his shoes, Blue’s tail, and the last small basket of fish he had and headed out the door.

 

With all the commotion at the docks, Lance didn’t have any trouble escaping to the western wood and Blue’s cove.

 

“Morning girl!” he shouted one there, “Big day today!”

 

The dragon stirred from her resting place curled up on a rock and glared at him.

 

“Yeah, I know it’s early, but c’mon!  We’re gonna really fly today!”

 

Blue’s ears flapped up, and then her head, expression curious.  She made a series of clacking noises Lance was starting to realize was her own way of speaking, and then crawled over to him.

 

Lance attached the fully finished and improved tail on with ease; hopefully this would be the last time he’d have to reattach it for a while.  He’d made the decision that once his mother and the others came back he’d try and be even more discreet about seeing Blue, which involved no odd package-carrying or midnight trips to see Pidge.

 

“Okay girl,” Lance climbed on her back, hooked himself in and pulled out the paper he’d written all of the different positions of the tail on, “Let’s fly.”

 

The two of them soared into the air, and Lance couldn’t help but smile as the ground receded from his feet.  They flew out of the cove and across the water, where the seastacks jutted out of the ocean like the grasping fingers of a long-forgotten god reaching for air.

 

Lance glanced at his cheat sheet, “Okay girl, we’re going to take this nice and slow.  Here we go; switching to position three, no, four.”

 

He moved his foot in the rigging to adjust Blue’s fin, and it moved exactly how it was supposed to.  They veered slowly in the air to the left, and Lance double-checked the rigging, his harness, and paper before facing forward again, anticipation churning in his stomach.

 

“Alright, it’s go time.  It’s go time.”  He held on tight as Blue flew up and then gently towards the water, levelling out sloppily, “Come on girl, we got this!”

 

They flew out towards the seastacks, having decided to use them as an obstacle course of sorts.  Lance couldn’t help but feel elation bloom in his chest as they flew between two of the giant rocks.

 

“Yes, it worked!” they flew higher above the water and right at another pair of stacks.  Lance tried to maneuver Blue to avoid them, but ended up nearly crashing into both of them.

 

“Sorry, sorry!” he yelled at the dragon as she tried to level out.

 

Blue shook her head and slapped her ear across his cheek.

 

“Yeah, yeah I’m on it.  Position four.  Three.”  he again adjusted his position, and the pair flew straight into the air, the white clouds ever growing closer as Blue flapped her sky-colored wings.

 

Lance had never felt more alive.  The wind was flush against his face and tousled his hair, heart hammering in his chest with excitement and adrenaline.

 

“Oh man, this is amazing!” Lance shouted at Blue, “How do you ever stop?  The wind in my―”

 

A rush of air tugged at the delicate paper attached to the saddle and jerked it into the air.

 

“My cheat sheet!” Lance yelled and scrambled as the paper fluttered around his face.  He leaned back and snatched it out of the air, but his sudden lunge caused Blue to lose momentum in the air.

 

There was a moment where Lace was weightless as his body and harness disconnected from the saddle, and he just had time to think _‘Oh quiznack’_ before he was free-falling through the air.

 

Lance screamed as he and Blue hurtled through the atmosphere and towards the ground. “Oh gods!  Oh no!” he spun through the air and spotted Blue, her yellow eyes wide with terror as she also fell, growling and screeching.

 

“Blue!” Lance yelled as he tried to maneuver towards her, “Don’t―It’s―you’ve gotta angle yourself―agh!” the dragon began to spin and he was thwacked in the face with her tail, “C’mon!”

 

Lance’s heart thudded in his chest as he saw the mountains quickly reaching up to greet them, and it took every ounce of his willpower not to panic.  By some miracle he was able to grab onto the dragon and haul himself onto the saddle, where he quickly reattached his harness and secured his feet in the proper position.  He was just able to pull up in time to angle her with the sloping hills and yelled as they approached a close group of large seastacks, and after realizing he had no time, threw away the sheet of paper.  He leaned forward, and on pure instinct moved his foot back and forth, switching from gear to gear as needed, dodging and slicing between the rocks with incredible speed.  His mind worked faster than ever, and before he even knew what had happened, he and Blue were gliding over open waters, safe and sound.

 

Lance sat in shock, breathing heavily before relief and elation burst forth in him.

 

“Yeah!” he laughed, raising his arms to the sky, “We did it!  Blue, you can fly again!”

 

Blue screeched in victory and blew a spurt of fire into the air.

 

“Oh come on,” Lance whined as they flew right into the blast, singeing his face and clothes.

 

Blue made a sound that could only be laughter as she arched through the air.  They flew together across the ocean and seastacks like that for what felt only for a few minutes, but soon Lance felt his stomach growl.  He hadn’t had a chance to eat before leaving that morning, and he veered Blue back towards Arus.  They landed in Blue’s cove, where Lance dumped the final basket of fish for her.  He scratched her back as the dragon dove into the pile of fish.

 

“I can’t believe it, Blue.  We were actually flying!” he plopped on the ground next to her, “ _I_ was flying, on a dragon!” he laughed, “Oh man, I wish Pidge could’ve seen that, or Hunk, he would’ve loved to be a part of this; the first Viking to fly: Lance Charles McClain!” he smiled, thinking of his best friends.  

 

And then he thought of Keith and his violet eyes, how bright they had been when they were kids and talking about dragons.  Before Shiro lost his arm and Matt had been taken, Keith had once admitted to him that he wished he could fly like them.  He remembered the awe on the pale boy’s face as they watched the creatures soar through the air, and the determined set of his jaw as Keith proclaimed that one day he’d soar through the air like them.  Lance remembered how his eyes blazed as he promised they’d be the best dragon fighters, because together they’d fly to the nest and destroy it so the dragons would have to leave and find a new place to raid every night.

 

He remembered that same fire blazing in those violet eyes when he vowed four years ago to take down any and every dragon that stood in his path.  Though his eyes had been shining with tears and his hands covered in his brother’s blood, he had never looked more beautiful, nor more strong than in that moment.  And Lance had promised to stay by his side always.

 

Lance gulped and wiped at his eyes.  He hadn’t realized that he’d been crying, and felt foolish for doing so; there was no reason to cry over lost things.

 

Blue grunted and sat up, sensing the sudden change in Lance’s mood.  She curled herself around him and cocked her head questioningly at him.

 

“Ah, Blue,” he sniffed, “It’s okay girl,” he rubbed the top of her head, and she nuzzled her nose against his, “I just wish he could’ve been here to see this, to see how wrong we are about you guys.  He would’ve loved this.”

 

Blue growled kindly and pulled back, then without warning regurgitated a fish head covered in spit right into his lap.

 

Lance grimaced and tried his best to smile, “Uh, no thanks.  I’ll get something at home.” he tossed the partial fish over in the rest of the pile and wiped his hands on his trousers. “ _Mí mamá_ should be there, waiting for me.  I hope I didn’t upset her too much by not being there earlier.”

 

Blue made a gesture that lance could only guess was the dragon equivalent of a shrug and nuzzled him again reassuredly.

 

He sighed and rubbed her head, “I’ll see you tomorrow, girl.” he smiled and got up, leaving the cove and wishing for tomorrow to come.

 

* * *

 

_Shiro_

Shiro wasn’t exactly sure what to expect when he went to the McClain residence that afternoon, but it wasn’t this.

 

What he got was Rosa and Lance McClain shouting at each other as they cooked and prepared a meal for what seemed at least half the village.  Well, at least, he assumed it was shouting; both of the Vikings’ voices were loud, but it seemed that was so they could hear each other over the clamor of their frantic cooking.

 

Shiro loudly cleared his throat, “May I come in?”

 

Rosa noticed the Chief first, and confusion flit across her features, “Shiro?  Of course, _entrá_!” she waved her hand at him.

 

Lance spun around to look at him as well, and the boy’s eyes widened in what looked like panic.

 

Shiro entered the house and moved toward the pair, feeling suddenly strange.  It was rare that he saw Rosa McClain unarmed, but he still caught the sense that just because she held no weapon made her any less dangerous.

 

“What can we do for you?” she asked, her arms crossed.

 

“I actually came to talk to you about Lance.  I’ve heard from Coran that he’s to compete against Keith tomorrow for the honor of killing the Crimson Nightmare.  I came to congratulate the both of you on what a great achievement this is, considering…” he trailed off and completely forgot what he had planned to say after that.

 

“Considering you didn’t think I could do it in the first place, right?” Lance spoke up.  His voice was strictly factual, betraying no emotion at all.

 

“ _Mí hijo,_ ” Rosa turned to her son, “ _tú_ _sabes_ _lo que quiere decir._ ”

 

“Of course I know what he means, Mamá, I only meant he’s not the only one surprised.”

 

Shiro was taken aback, “I suppose you two have already discussed this, then?”

 

“ _Sí,_ ” Rosa’s eyes beamed, “And I couldn’t be more proud of him!  You just wait, Takashi Shirogane, my son will be the bravest and best of all Vikings you’ve ever seen,” she looked to her son and back, “I guarantee it.”

 

A spark of irritation made Shiro raise an eyebrow.  Against Keith?  He couldn’t help but find this unlikely, but he hadn’t seen what Lance could do.  Perhaps tomorrow would be exciting.

 

* * *

 

_Keith_

All Keith wanted to do was sleep.  But Shiro was forcing him to go to the party tonight celebrating not only Shiro and the others’ safe return, but also the first ever one-on-one showdown for the final exam, which meant Keith _had_ to attend.  It wouldn’t be good sportsmanship if he didn’t at least show up to a party being half-held for him.  Besides, Shiro said, if keith was to become Chief he should start trying to make friends with the villagers.  Though as he stood around a large bonfire, watching said villagers drink, shout, dance, and sing off key, Keith wasn’t sure he _wanted_ to be Chief.

 

Keith made his way through the crowd until he found Lance and Hunk, the two of them talking excitedly about something while Pidge stood beside them, munching on a chicken leg that was bigger than her face.  Slowly he approached the three of them and tried for a smile.

 

Pidge noticed him first, “Hey Keith,” she said in her monotone voice, raising her chicken in greeting, “Come join us.”

 

“Yeah!” Hunk turned to him, “We were just talking about the probability that we’re looking in the wrong place for the Nest; after all, if we’ve been searching this long and haven’t found anything―”

 

Pidge cut him off, “Who’s to say it’s not in the complete opposite direction?”

 

Keith thought about that for a moment, “I suppose that’s possible, but if that’s the case, why are all the ships attacked by dragons whenever we go there?”

 

Pidge opened her mouth to say something, then closed it, “Damn.  Hadn’t thought of that.”

 

“Well, okay, then how have we not been able to get even close to the Nest in all the times our ships have gone out?” Hunk interjected.

 

“Maybe because we can’t reach it by water,” Lance spoke up, turning all heads toward him, “I mean, dragons fly everywhere, and if it’s the dragon’s nest…”

 

“The entrance could be where we can’t get to,” Keith finished for him, “Lance, that’s genius!”

 

Lance’s eyes went comically wide at Keith’s comment, and he wondered―nope, it was just the firelight making Lance’s cheeks red.

 

Pidge scoffed, “Well, I wouldn’t call him a _genius_ , but―”

 

“Paladins!” Coran’s booming voice interrupted, “I’ve come to give you refreshments!  It serves that you’re all old enough now, after nearly completing your Paladin training, to partake in our traditional drink of the gods!” he shoved small mugs in all of their faces.

 

Hunk raised an eyebrow, “Coran, we’ve had mead with our dinners since we were kids, I hardly think―”

 

“Oh no, this is _not_ your everyday diluted mead,” Coran wagged a finger, “This is Nunvill, brewed specially by yours truly!  It’s been aging since Shiro was a wee thing.”

 

Keith sniffed at the liquid being shoved in his face, “So only three years?”

 

Lance snorted, and Hunk had to pat Pidge on the back to keep her from choking.

 

“Do my ears deceive me, or did the infamous stick-in-the-mud Keith Kogane actually make a joke?” Lance asked, incredulous.

 

“Hey, I’m not _that_ bad,” he huffed.

 

Coran chuckled, “I will admit, Keith, making jokes at the expense of your brother’s unfortunate birthdate is rather amusing,” he twisted his mustache a bit, “So, a toast!” the Viking raised his cup, “To my future dragon-slayers; may your swords ever be sharp and your aim ever true!”

 

“Aye!” Keith, Pidge, and Hunk raised their mugs enthusiastically against Coran’s.  Lance held back a moment and then raised his as well.

 

Keith found this odd, but didn’t think much of it as he raised the cup to his lips, took a sip, and nearly choked.  This Nunvill tasted like his feet smelled, mixed with spoiled meat.

 

The other Paladins seemed to think the same thing as they all grimaced and twitched upon sampling the fermented drink.

 

“Well!  I’m off, gotta keep these fire going somehow!” Coran downed the whole of his mug and walked off.

 

The moment he was gone the four teens spat out their drinks and coughed together.

 

“Ugh, that is the nastiest thing I’ve ever tasted!” Hunk exclaimed, “How does he get away with this kind of stuff?”

 

“It’s unclear, but I’d like to know,” Pidge gagged, “Ugh, my throat’s burning.”

 

“Yeah, that’s even worse than raw fish,” Lance commented.

 

“What?” Keith asked.  His tongue felt funny, “You’ve had raw fish?”

 

“Uh,” Lance’s eyes widened, and Keith thought he saw Pidge raise an eyebrow before he continued, “I mean, I once undercooked a fish and bit into it while it was still raw,” he shuddered, “nasty stuff.”

 

“Lance,” Hunk sighed, “This is why I always tell you: cut a slit and look inside before you eat slow-roasted meat!”

 

Lance groaned, like the two of them had been having this conversation forever, “Yeah, I know, but it was one time and I was really hungry!”

 

Hunk just shook his head, “Next time your mom goes off on a mission I’m cooking you dinner every night.”

 

“Aw, thanks babe,” Lance fake smiled at Hunk, who rolled his eyes.

 

This interaction made Keith feel hollow inside.  Once upon a time it was the three of them at Lance or Hunk’s house when parents and Shiro went off hunting for the Nest.  But after Lance had stopped speaking to Keith, Hunk had dropped most communication, too.  The larger boy still talked to Keith, of course, but for a while it was very strained, and Keith knew that if it came down to it, Hunk would choose to be on Lance’s side in a heartbeat.  The thought didn’t sting as much as it used to, but this casual reminder of how cut off he had become from the two boys made his chest ache.

 

“Ugh, get a room, you two,” Pidge rolled her eyes.

 

“See, as much as _I_ wouldn’t mind,” Lance replied, sweeping his long arms in front of him, “Hunk is tragically not into boys or girls, Pidgeon.  He’s into rocks.”

 

Hunk made an indignant squawk as Pidge cackled, “Says the guy who’s dad is out who-knows-where researching rocks!”

 

“On the contrary, my father is trying to map out the known world by boat!” Lance beamed, “I might join him someday.”

 

Keith had forgotten that’s what Lance’s father had been doing. “That’s right,” he said, “I remember him telling your mom that he’d come back with a fully functioning map that would allow us to locate any dragon nest with ease.”

 

Lance turned to Keith with a funny look and opened his mouth to speak when a loud crash from across the street caught their attention.  Keith whirled around to see two Vikings having an arm-wrestling match and nearly breaking tables with the force of their arms. The four teens watched from afar as the next two Vikings struggled with each other for a moment until one proved victorious.  There was another round of cheers and shouts of “Hoo-rah!”

 

“Hey, we need to get something like that,” Hunk suddenly said.

 

“Like what?” Lance asked.

 

“Y’know, like a cheer, like a team cheer that we do!”

 

“Hunk, we’re not a team,” Pidge raised an eyebrow.

 

“Pshaw,” Hunk waved her comment off.

 

“Hmm,” Lance mused, then smiled, “Okay, how about…I say Vol, you say tron!  Vol…” he wagged his eyebrows, waiting for someone to finish.

 

Keith was confused, “Uhhh, Voltron?”

 

“No, no no no, the cheer includes the instructions: I say Vol, you say…”

 

Keith raised an eyebrow, “Vol…tron?”

 

Lance shook his head and turned away, “We’ll work on it.” he then took another sp of his Nunvill, and Keith had to keep himself from laughing at the boy’s instantaneous reaction to the horrid liquid.

 

“Why Voltron anyway?” Pidge asked, “Isn’t he, like, the god of cats or something?”

 

“Actually, according to legend,” Hunk interjected, “Voltron was a god made up of five individuals who all fought side-by-side and were the best of companions.”

 

“But there’s only four of us.”

 

“Not if you count Coran!”

 

Keith rolled his eyes and turned to look for Shiro.  It had been a while since he’s spotted his brother and decided to go find him.

 

When he did find Shiro, he was talking to Erik Garrett over by the town hall.

 

“Ah here he is,” Shiro smiled, “the man of the hour!” he wrapped an arm around Keith’s shoulder, “Mark my words, Erik, Keith will make a great dragon slayer and a good leader for the village one day.”

 

Keith tried not to blush under his brother’s paise, but the pride in his eyes was unmistakable.  “I’ll do my best,” he said quietly.

 

Erik laughed, a deep, throaty laugh like his son Hunk’s, “Indeed, I think you will!  If it’s one thing I know about you, Keith Kogane, it’s that you’re too stubborn to quit.”

  
Keith laughed too, and knew that Erik was right, though he also thought the same to be true of Lance.  He just hoped his stubbornness and skill would last long enough against Lance and his talents tomorrow, if nothing else other than making Shiro proud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of commentary on this chapter:
> 
> 1\. Most of my inspiration for writing the flight scene came not only from the film, but actual sea stacks and mountainous trails ending in beaches such as La Push's 3rd Beach in Washington. If you can, I recommend hiking/going there. It's absolutely stunning and the perfect stage for Arus/Berk's scenery.
> 
> 2\. I hope you didn't mind me going off movie and book with this chapter; I got really excited with the idea of Arus having a party similar to the one they have in Voltron and decided to run with it!
> 
> 3\. About Lance's family and why they speak Spanish even though no one else does, it's because his father is an Arus-born Viking, travels around a lot, met Rosa on one of his travels, and fell in love. She came from another clan of Vikings kinda like the Amazons, which is why she's such a good dragon-fighter, and also why she speaks Spanish. She lives on Arus because that's where she and her husband made their home together, and thinks it a good place to raise Lance. We'll get to explore the other tribes/clans of Vikings in "book/movie 2" if you will, so look forward to that!
> 
> Thanks for reading! <3


	8. Heroes, or Exiles?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flying is a lot more fun with two, wouldn't you say?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! I'm sorry about the delay in updating; this chapter ended up having a lot more moving parts than I originally planned, and I wanted to make sure it would live up to expectations. Thank you for your patience <3
> 
> P.S. this chapter is formatted a lil' different than the ones before for the characters switches because I didn't want to confuse you. Enjoy!
> 
> And now, to the scenes you've patiently waited and suffered for :3c

_Keith_

Keith slammed his back against the wooden barricade, heart pounding and chest heaving.  He and Lance had already battled four other dragons, one after another, and the effort was starting to get to him.  Not only was he trying to stay alive and take down the dragons, but Keith was also trying to do it before Lance, or at least outdo him in one way or another, and it was starting to really wear him out.  Plus there was the pressure of Shiro’s eyes on him at all times, eager and proud.  

 

He couldn’t fail.

 

The crowd above him roared and cheered as the Yellow Gronkle they were fighting flew about, and Keith poked his head above the barricade to get a look at where it was.  He was always amazed at how difficult it was to take down the thick-headed creature, even as it clumsily crashed about.  But he’d been studying its movements and knew when to strike.

 

Lance crashed into the barricade next to him, making the light wood wobble behind their backs and Keith almost lost his balance.  He turned to glare at the taller Paladin and shoved his shoulder.

 

“Stay out of my way,” he said to Lance, “I’m winning this thing.” he jumped up over the barricade, keeping a close watch on the dragon as it blasted and barrelled into everything.  He ducked down behind another barricade and took a deep breath, realizing the moment was just about right.  “This time,” he muttered, “This time, for sure!”

 

Keith stood and ran across the arena at the dragon, sword raised and ready to strike when the creature suddenly collapsed to the ground, Lance standing beside it with a helpless expression.  The crowds roared in shock and excitement.

 

“No!” Keith shrieked, “You son of a half-troll, rat-eating―rrrrgh!!” his blood boiled under his skin; that dragon should’ve been _his_ !  Where the hell had Lance _come_ from?  What did he _do_?

 

Shiro called for silence as Coran came down into the ring and dragged the Gronkle back into its cage.

 

“Okay, well, I’ll see you guys,” Lance waved and began to walk out, but the mustached Viking grabbed him by the back of his shirt.

 

“Oh no you don’t.”

 

“I―I’m kinda late for, um”

 

“What?” Keith exploded at him, holding his sword up to the other boy’s throat, “Late for _what_ , exactly?”  what on Odin’s great green earth could _Lance_ have that he’d be late for, or have that was more important than this moment?

 

“Silence!” Shiro shouted, “Our Elder has decided!”

 

Keith tried to regain some semblance of composure as he looked up to where Shiro stood, along with the old woman known around the village as Old Wrinkly.  For as long as Keith could remember, anytime a big decision was made in the village, Old Wrinkly was consulted, and her opinion nearly a;was ended any argument or dispute.  She had been the one to swear in Shiro as Chief, and every time a baby was born she was the first to hold it after the parents and give the child their Viking name of Arus.  If the Council and Shiro were the pillars of the village, Old Wrinkly was the cornerstone.

 

Coran stood between the two boys as the old woman appraised the both of them from above.  Coran held a hand above Keith’s head, a question on his face.

 

The Elder shook her head.

 

Murmurs and gasps rippled through the crowd as Coran then put his hand above Lance’s head.

 

The Elder smiled and nodded.

 

Cheers and shouts erupted from the crowd, and Keith felt his stomach drop.

 

“Oh, you’ve done it, Lance!” Coran practically squealed, shaking the lanky boy by the arms, “You get to kill the dragon!”

 

Lance’s eyes glassed over and stood limply as Hunk lifted him onto his shoulders. “Ah, yes.  I get to―yeah,” he stared, expressionless at the crowd of people, “I’m so...excited.”

 

Everyone was yelling and cheering as Lance was carried up out of the arena and to the dining hall, where Keith knew a victory feast was waiting.

 

Keith was shell-shocked and shaking.  Lance McClain was going to kill a dragon before him.  Lance McClain was going to become a true Viking of Arus, a member of society, and would risk his life fighting dragons every night.

 

Keith had to curl his hands into fists to keep them from shaking.  It didn’t make sense; how could Lance go from being― _Lance_ ―to being better than him in dragon-fighting?  It was one thing for him to keep up with him in training; Keith never went full-out then for fear of straining himself, but for Lance to actually _beat_ him?  It was impossible!  Keith had been training and preparing for this moment his whole life; everyone expected him to be as great as Shiro, if not better, and so much rode on his success or failures.  Lance had been forced to stay away from the brunt of the dragon-intensive by the Council, never being allowed to participate for fear of him getting injured.

 

So _how_ did he get to be this good so quickly?

 

Keith thought it might have something to do with Lance disappearing to the western wood.  It must be the answer.  Whatever Lance was doing there every day changed him.

 

Keith had to know what it was, and he was determined to figure it out.

 

* * *

 

 

_Lance_

Lance was not excited.  

 

He wasn’t honored, or proud, or any of the things he should be because Old Wrinkly chose him over Keith.  He ought to lord this over the mullet, the boy who thought he’d never be good enough, beating him in the one thing that mattered so much to the both of them.  But Lance found he didn’t want to; that he wanted nothing to do with any of this dragon-slaying business anymore.  He’d only continued to attend Paladin training for so long because 1) he knew Coran would have his head otherwise, and 2) how else was he supposed to test his discoveries with Blue to see if it was the same with dragons all across the board?

 

But now Lance realized what a mistake that had been.  He couldn’t kill another dragon, no matter who told him to, or who expected it of him.  He also couldn’t ever say why, because he knew the village wasn’t ready for that kind of change.

 

So after dinner that night Lance packed a few belongings in a sack and snuck out to Blue’s cove.  The sun was setting over the tops of the trees, and Lance hoped that he’d have enough light to properly pack up Blue before they took off.  No matter how much he hated the idea of leaving Hunk, Pidge, and his mother behind, he knew that it would be better for them if he just disappeared without a trace.  

 

Pidge would know, of course, or at least guess what had happened; she was always good at guessing things like that.  He wondered whether she’d keep his secret after they were gone, or if the pressure would be too much and the young girl would cave?

 

Whatever the case, it wasn’t important now; he’d be far and away by the time anyone noticed his absence.

 

Lance crawled through the pathway into the cove as the sun cast purple and orange reflections in the lake’s surface.

 

“Hey girl,” he called into the space, “Let’s pack up.  We’re going on a trip...for a long, long time.” Lance sighed and removed his coat to stuff it in his sack when a strange noise caught his attention.

 

Lance looked up to find the source of the noise and came face-to-face with Keith’s sword, and above it Keith _himself_ sitting on Blue’s rock sharpening his blade.

 

“Keith!” Lance yelped, “What the―I mean,” he tried to compose himself and behave naturally, “Wh―what are you doing here?”

 

Keith looked up from his sword and levelled a cool glare at him, “I wanna know what’s going on.” he jumped off the rock and sauntered toward Lance, tossing his weapon from hand to hand.

 

Lance scrambled backwards, trying to stay out of range of the blade but not entirely succeeding as Keith pressed on.  His heart was hammering in his chest; it wasn’t unusual for Keith to be antagonistic, but his body language felt much more hostile and threatening right then, no matter the 3 inches of height Lance had on him.

 

“Nobody just _gets_ as good as you, Lance.  Especially so quickly.  Especially you.” his violet eyes were dark, “So start talking.  Are you training with someone?”

 

He was still flipping his sword around, and it took everything in Lance to focus on not being sliced by it. “Training?”

 

The red Paladin reached out with one hand and tugged down on the harness straps across Lance’s chest, “Tell me it doesn’t involve _this_!”

 

“Um,” Lance spluttered, the contact of Keith’s fingers so close to his chest burning, “Yeah, no, I―”

 

Something rustled across the cove, and Keith broke his glare off of Lance to turn towards it.

 

 _‘No’_ Lance thought desperately, _‘Not Blue.’_

 

“You’re right!” Lance jumped in front of Keith, who simply shoved past him, “I’m through with the lies, Keith.  You see, I’ve been making―outfits!” he kept trying to block Keith’s vision of the cove so he wouldn’t see anything, “So, you got me,” he grabbed Keith’s wrist and held it up to his own chest, “take me back, tell everyone, and―”

 

Without warning the Paladin grabbed Lance’s wrist and twisted his arm back around painfully, knocking the boy to the ground.

 

“ _¡Dios mío!_ ” Lance squealed, “ _¿Por qué?_ ”

 

“That’s for the lies,” Keith said harshly, “And _that_ ,” he dropped his sword hilt onto Lance’s stomach, “is for everything else.”

 

Lance groaned and clutched his stomach, trying to regain his breath.  A familiar clacking noise came from across the cove, and Lance felt he really _couldn’t_ breathe. “No,” he murmured, trying to stand.

 

Keith turned to the noise as Blue walked into a patch of bright sunlight, exposing herself to him.

 

He gasped and shoved Lance back to the ground, “Get down!” he yelled and turned to face Blue, sword at the ready, “Lance, run!”

 

The moment he touched Lance Blue growled and started to charge at Keith.

 

“No!” Lance shouted and shoved Keith out of the way, knocking his sword out of his hand and across the grass, “Stop!” he yelled at Blue and stood between the two of them, “It’s okay!” he pressed on Blue’s snout and tried to keep his voice steady, “It’s okay girl, he’s a friend.  He’s a friend.”

 

Blue stopped under Lance’s hand but didn’t relax as she glared at Keith.  Lance turned and saw Keith sprawled out on the ground, mouth and eyes as big as plates at the dragon and boy, “Lance, what the quiznack―”

 

“You just scared her!”

 

“ _I_ scared _her_?” Keith yelled back, and Blue growled, “Who is ‘her’?”

 

Lance sighed and gestured to the Paladin, “Keith, meet Blue.  Blue, this is Keith.” he tried for a smile, but it didn’t work as Blue just beared her teeth and growled at Keith.

 

The other boy shook his head and ran off before Lance had a chance to say anything else.

 

“And that’s it, we’re dead!” Lance threw up his arms as Blue sat up and strutted away, “Whoa, just where do you think _you’re_ going, little lady?”

  


_Keith_

Keith had no idea what had just happened.  He had no idea what he’d just seen, and he wasn’t so sure he wanted to know.  But every instinct in his body, from his erratic heartbeat to his hair standing on end, was telling him to run, to get the hell away, to just _run_.

 

Where?  No idea.  Just― _away_ , to process things.  And then he’d probably tell Shiro, because that’s what he’s always done whenever something happened that he didn’t understand.  So he ran.

 

Keith ran until he heard the unmistakable sound of leathery wings flapping above him, and he barely had time to register that the dragon was following him before he was snatched into the air, claws wrapped around his arms. He screamed as the earth was pulled out from underneath his feet and they dangled freely in the air, going higher and higher.

 

“HOLY ODIN’S GHOST―” he screamed and swore as he was thrown from the air into the tallest branches of a pine tree.

 

Keith grabbed onto a branch for dear life as the Blue Fury landed in the tree just beside him, and on the creature’s back was―

 

“LANCE!” he shouted, “Get me down from here!”

 

Keith could just make out Lance’s figure as he struggled to get closer to the center of the tree and climb down, “Keith, you have to give me a chance to explain!”

 

“I am not listening to _anything_ you have to say until I am safely on the ground!”

 

“Then I won’t speak!” Lance yelled back, and Keith turned to look at him, “Just let me show you.”

 

Keith looked from Lance to the ground and back.  It was a really long way.  He groaned and climbed over to where Lance and his dragon were perched.  Slowly he crawled over to them, knocked Lance’s extended hand away, and swung his legs over the back of the dragon behind the taller boy.  “Okay,” he gritted his teeth, trying not to sound as scared as he was, “Now put me down.”

 

Lance sighed and patted the creature, “Right; now Blue, down, please.  Gently.”

 

The dragon huffed and extended her wings, catching the wind around them like giant blue sails, the only anchor to the tree being her legs and claws.  Reflexively Keith gripped the back of Lance’s tunic with his fist as they started to ascend.

 

“See?” Lance turned to look back at him, “Nothing to be afraid of!”

 

And then they shot into the air faster than either of them could blink, Keith’s screams―and stomach―lost to the wind.  They flew over the Western Wood and out across the water, dipping erratically up and down, the dragon splashing in the water and soaring high through the air.  The wind whipped at Keith’s hair, and every movement threatened to unseat him from the dragon’s back and into open air.  Screams and curses were ripped from his lungs as he clutched onto Lance like a lifeline.

 

“BLUE,” Lance shrieked, “What are you doing?  We need him to like us!” Keith could just tell through his panic that Lance was doing everything in his power to level the dragon out, but she had a mind of her own, “She’s never like this!”  

 

Keith clamped his eyes shut and continued to yell profanities at the pair of them as they zoomed straight up into the air and began to corkscrew in a blur through the clouds.

 

“And now the spinning!” Lance huffed, “Thank you for nothing, you useless reptile!” they continued to spiral downwards towards the ocean when Keith finally got a grip.

 

“Okay!” he choked out, “I am sorry, I’m sorry!  Just get me off this thing, please!”

 

The dragon growled, and with one final lurch and yelp from Keith, they levelled out, gently soaring above the waters and into the setting sun.

 

 

_Lance_

Lance didn’t so much see as _felt_ when Keith finally relaxed behind him.  The boy had practically molded himself into Lance’s backside during the chaos of Blue’s temperamental flight, and he felt every muscle and tendon of Keith’s relax and release against his spine as Keith released the deathgrip around his shoulders and leaned back.  He still held onto Lance, though, and the Blue Paladin tried not to be hyper-aware of this fact as they flew gently upward and above the clouds.  The setting sun burned the clouds beautiful oranges, pinks, and purple colors, and to Lance it looked as if the entire world were on fire around them.  He glanced back at Keith and saw his violet eyes wide at the fiery sky around them, mouth slack with awe and wonder.  The Paladin looked like he belonged perfectly here in the burning clouds, his jet-black hair a perfect contrast to the pastel sky. It was difficult for Lance to face forward again and keep Blue in the air, especially as Keith’s arms around his chest softened into a gentle grip around the waist.

 

“Okay, I gotta admit it, this is pretty cool.” Keith gently spoke, “It’s...amazing,” Lance could feel Keith’s breath on the back of his neck, “You’re amazing.”

 

A strange sensation blossomed in the pit of Lance’s gut at this sudden closeness, a sort of welcome sting that did things to his heartbeat and breathing that hadn’t happened since the last time he and Keith had really spoken.

 

Blue grunted below them indignantly, and Keith tensed behind him, “I mean―You’re amazing, Blue! You’re really, really, incredible!”

 

Lance felt his cheeks burn as Blue made her usual clacking noises, and was thankful Keith couldn’t see his face.  They remained silent as the sun set below the waters, washing the world in the black of night illuminated only by the stars and full moon above them.  Blue guided them back over towards Arus, and Lance had to stifle a gasp at seeing his village in such a sight; he had never realized how beautiful and so small their corner of the world was in comparison to the mountain ranges they called home.  It was also a strange, yet comforting sight to see all the fires from houses and torches illuminated in tiny little dots across the island.  They flew around the village, careful to not be seen by anyone, and over the eastern side of the countryside to open waters.

 

“So what happens now?” Keith finally asked the question Lance had been dreading, and he just groaned. “Lance, your final exam is tomorrow, you know you’re going to have to kill―” he stopped himself and murmured fiercely in Lance’s ear, “Kill a dragon.”

 

“Don’t remind me,” Lance lamented, anxiety starting to crawl up his spine.

 

Suddenly Blue pitched sharply downward and into a thick fog.

 

“Woah!” Lance yelped, “Blue, what’s happening?”

 

Blue’s only only response was to flap her wings erratically, like something made her nervous.

 

Sensing the change in his dragon, Lance tried to calm her down, “What is it, girl?” he looked around through the fog, and without warning a Crimson Nightmare came soaring through the air, a shark dangling from his claws.

 

The two boys gasped, “Get down!” Keith hissed at Lance as they pressed their stomachs as close to Blue’s back as they could.

 

Disembodied clackings and coos and calls started to sound around them while more and more dragons appeared in the fog, all of them carrying a type of dead animal or another.

 

“What’s going on?” Keith whispered in Lance’s ear.

 

Lance looked around, “It looks like they’re hauling in their kill.”

 

“Then what exactly does that make us?”

 

Lance leaned over to Blue’s ears, “C’mon girl, we need to get out of here.”

 

Blue snorted in response and tried to maneuver away but was blocked by the dragons all around her.  They were stuck in the middle of a flock of dragons as they all flew together in the same direction.

 

Lance had a hard time seeing through the dark and fog, but he could feel the shifts and changes as Blue went along with the other dragons around her.  It was nearly impossible to tell how many of the creatures there were as the noises all began to bleed and blend together, but he could tell there were a lot of them.  He could feel every uncertain breath Keith took on his neck, and hoped he couldn’t tell how fast Lance’s heart was beating.

 

Blue lurched quickly downwards, and through the mist Lance was able to make out the dark masses of the Marmoran sea stacks his mother cursed nearly as much as the dragons themselves.  She told him that more boats were sunk and more Vikings were lost to those rocks than anything else on their expeditions, and he could see why.  

 

Blue, however, seemed to know exactly where they were and how to avoid colliding with them as she and the other dragons moved towards an island made of caves and coves.  With a single flap of her wings they flew into one of the entrances, and the wave of steam and heat sent a shock through Lance’s system.  The air was humid and thick, and the black rocks themselves seemed to be emanating heat.  

 

“What my brother wouldn’t give to find this,” Keith breathed.

 

They flew into a large cavern, where the world became a mosaic of black and orange and mist.  Dragons were pouring in from all directions, flying out and across the cavern.  Lance scanned the scene and realized they must be inside a volcano of sorts, because only magma could glow that brightly and give off so much steam.

 

The cavern was intimidating and yet beautiful all at the same time, with the magma below them washing the cavern in a soft orange glow.

 

Blue flew across the cavern and found a perch closer to the top of the rocks.  Lance watched as all of the other dragons flew over one spot of the cavern in particular and dropped whatever item it was they were carrying over the glowing mist.

 

“Well, it’s satisfying to know that all of our food has been dumped down a hole.” Lance scoffed as each dragon then picked a perch like Blue.

 

“They’re not eating any of it,” Keith murmured.

 

The dragons continued to fly in for another moment before one last Gronkle bumbled across the cavern, seeming a little dazed.  It paused over the expanse where the others had dropped their kill, and regurgitated one small fish down into the pit.

 

There was a moment where the dragon began to flutter over to a place in the cavern when out of the mist a giant mouth full of teeth swallowed it whole.  And connected to that monstrous mouth was a monstrous head, and every dragon in the cavern retreated further into the shadows, hissing and clacking and crying out.

 

Keith gasped and gripped Lance’s waist tighter, “What is that?” he whispered as the dragon kept rising up, up, up out of the mist into the cavern.

 

It was bigger than huge.  Its scales were the size of Lance’s shield, its teeth were taller than Shiro, and its eyes were as yellow as the sun.

 

“Blue, we have to get out of here,” Lance swallowed, “Now!”

 

Blue leapt immediately into action, and not a moment too soon, because the monstrous dragon had caught their scent and snapped at where they had just been.

 

All of the other dragons shrieked and zoomed out of the nest as quickly as they could behind Blue, terror in each and every one of their cries.

 

Once he could see the line of Arus on the horizon, Lance breathed a sigh of relief.  Blue soared over the western wood to her cove, where she touched down gently.

 

“What in Thor’s name just happened?” Lance exploded.

 

“It totally makes sense!” Keith sat up, “It’s like a giant beehive: they’re the workers, and that’s their queen.  It controls them!” he swung off of Blue and began to run, “We have to tell Shiro.”

 

“No!” Lance yelled and jumped after Keith, grabbing his arm, “Keith, no, we can’t!  They’ll kill Blue!” his mind was racing and whirring, scattered thoughts and ideas and how pretty the moonlight made Keith look crashing about in his head, “We have to think this through, carefully.” he let go of Keith and walked back towards Blue. “ _Dios mío_ ; _¿qué vamos a hacer?_ ”

 

“Lance, we just discovered the dragons’ _nest_ , the thing Vikings have been looking for since we first sailed here, and you want to keep it a secret?” Keith’s voice was incredulous, “To protect your―your pet dragon?”

 

Lance stopped and turned to face Keith.  He looked the other Paladin right in the eyes. “Yes.”

 

There was a pause where Keith stared at him, and Lance tried not to appear as wired and worried as he was.

 

“Okay,” Keith said softly, “Then what do we do?”

 

Lance shook his head, “Just give me until tomorrow; I’ll figure something out.”

 

There was a silence between the two of them as Lance turned to grab his things.

 

“Y’know,” Keith said softly, “I always hoped you’d be the best dragon-tamer of all of us.  I mean, you always were the most determined of anybody that I knew, and I know me, so, I’ve always hoped you’d succeed.”

 

Lance stopped and whirled around, “Then why―?”

 

“―did I agree with the council’s decision to ban you from dragon-training?” Keith scoffed, “It’s simple: I was scared, Lance.”

 

“What?”

 

Keith took a deep breath, “After Shiro lost his arm and Matt was taken, I―” he closed his eyes, “I realized how easy it would be for the dragons to get to you, too.  So I asked Shiro to make sure you didn’t join dragon training.  I didn’t want to lose you.”

 

Lance felt his cheeks warm and wondered why his heart was racing so. “Why didn't you just tell me that, then?  At least then I would’ve known you didn’t think I was too weak and useless to be a good fighter.”

 

Keith snapped up to look at him, “You thought that’s how I saw you?  Weak and useless?”

 

“Well, I mean, yeah,” he spluttered, “that’s how the council saw me, so it only made sense that if you agreed with them, that you’d think that, too.”

 

“No!” Keith huffed, “That’s not―” he stopped and seemed to wrestle with the words coming out of his mouth, “That’s why you shut me out, isn’t it?”

 

Lance looked down at his toes, shame starting to wash over him, “Yeah.”

 

“You thought I secretly hated you?”

 

“Yeah,” he muttered quietly.

 

“Lance,” Keith said gently, and his tone made Lance look up to meet his violet eyes, the same color as the sky above him, “I could never hate you.”

 

The implication and meaning of what they had both said sunk in.  They stared at each other for a moment, both feeling as if they were seeing the other for the very first time in a long while.  A smile started to pull at Lance’s lips, and he couldn’t help but watch as Keith’s did the same.  His heart thudded in his chest, and that strange feeling from before spread throughout his gut, a welcome and wonderful pain as he saw Keith’s eyes flick from his eyes to his lips and back again.  Keith nervously swallowed, and Lance stared as his Adam’s apple bobbed with the motion.  He could feel himself leaning down towards those lips as Keith’s perfect jaw tilted upwards to his, and Lance let his eyes flutter closed when―

 

Blue’s tail smacked Lance square on the chest, knocking him backwards from Keith and making him windmill his long arms just to stay on his feet.

 

“Wha― _Blue_!” Lance cried, his cheeks feeling as if they had taken on the work of the sun.  He turned to look back at Keith and found he couldn’t bring himself to meet the other boy’s eyes, “Sorry, I―” he stopped and collected his thoughts.  “Sorry, Keith, but there are things I have to figure out before the test tomorrow.”

 

“Yeah,” Keith stammered, his cheeks also a much warmer color than normal, “No, yeah, that’s much more―important than―yeah.”

 

“Maybe once this is all over we can…pick up here?” he looked hopefully over at the red Paladin, still a little unable to meet his eyes.

 

“Yeah,” Keith said louder, “I―I’d be fine with that.”

 

Lance couldn’t help but grin like an idiot at that, “Good, I’m looking forward to it.  We make a pretty good team when we’re not fighting each other.”

 

The smile Keith gave him then almost made the last three years of pain worth every moment, “We do, don’t we?”

 

Lance smiled back and held out his hand.  Keith took it, then sharply twisted his arm and pinned it behind him.

 

Lance cursed, “Keith, what the―?”

 

“That’s for kidnapping me.” he said nonchalantly and released him.

 

Lance, bewildered, turned to look at Blue.  The dragon just shook her head and rumbled, almost saying _‘Beats me, kiddo.’_

 

He looked back at Keith to see the pale boy nervously brush back the hair from his face, and quicker than he could think, Keith grabbed his harness and kissed him on the cheek.

 

“That’s for―everything else.”

 

Lance stood in shock, his hand fluttering up to where Keith’s lips had just been, and watched as the Paladin dashed away.  Blue came up beside him, a knowing look in her eyes.

  
“Shut up,” Lance said to the dragon, but there wasn’t any venom in his voice.  He turned back to gather up his things and go home, wondering what he was going to do about tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *wipes eyes* QUIZNACK these two are going to be the death of me *blows nose loudly*
> 
> Quick P.S. with the way my schedule and life are working, I'm going to start updating every 2 weeks instead of every week. Sorry about the change, but I think it'll be the best with where the story is going and how important these clinching chapters are. Thanks for all of your continued support!!! <3


	9. The Fiendishly Clever Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Di prickle-burgers est inna thunderpuffs issa zapping
> 
> (Cowell Dragonese)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for bearing with me these past few weeks and all the delays; I have had very little time to write these past few days and have been stealing seconds wherever I can. You all are so wonderful though, and I am so thankful for you all!
> 
> Enjoy this ridiculously long and feels-filled chapter! <3
> 
> (Also, why Lance calls Shiro 'Jefe Platino' in this chapter is because translated from Japanese, Shirogane means platinum, so he roughly says 'Chief Shirogane' :3)

_Pidge_

It was just before dawn when Pidge awoke to her father gently shaking her.

 

“Pidge...Katie; wake up.  You have visitors.”

 

“What?” Pidge groaned.  It was too early for _anything_ to be happening.

 

“Your friends are here saying they need your help.  It seems urgent.”

 

Pidge rubbed her eyes, “Who?” she didn’t know anyone who willingly woke up this early.

 

“Lance McClain and Keith Kogane.”

 

 _That_ woke her up.  “The two of them?   _Together_?”

 

Sam Holt nodded, “They’re telling me that they need some advice on a weapon before Lance’s exam today.”

 

Pidge sat up and scrambled for her glasses.  So that explained why Lance was here, and so early.  She knew the moment Old Wrinkly chose him he’d be in panic mode trying to figure out what to do.  But that didn’t explain why Keith was here, too.

 

The young Paladin ran out of her bedroom to the kitchen, where the two boys in question were waiting for her.  They stood close to each other, worry and hope mirrored on both of their faces.

 

“Pidge,” Lance blurted the moment he saw her, “We’re in a bit of a pickle, and you’re the only one that can help.”

 

“ _We_?” Pidge eyed the two of them, raising an eyebrow.

 

Lance barely bat an eye, “He knows everything.”

 

Pidge’s eyes went wide, “You told him _everything_?”

 

Keith scoffed, “I didn’t really give him much of a choice.”

 

“Look, we can tell you the whole story later, but right now we need your brains and know-how,” Lance said quickly, “So will you help us or not?”

 

Pidge looked from Keith to Lance.  The tension between them hadn’t disappeared, but had changed, somehow.  And from the way they stood together, it seemed they had finally worked through some things.

 

She sighed and nodded. “Okay, but first we tell Hunk.”

 

Keith flinched slightly while Lance grinned, “He was next on our hit list, anyway.  You and Keith get to wake him up.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Hunk_

The only thing Hunk liked about this plan was that Lance had the forethought to bring breakfast.  Other than that,

 

“Look, I hate to be the voice of reason, as always, but guys!” he protested at the three teens before him, “This is insane!  We could get banished for even _talking_ about this!”

 

“Shiro wouldn’t banish us,” Keith said fervently, looking at Lance.  

 

That was something else Hunk was trying to figure out.  It was odd, finding out that his best friend had been hiding a dragon for the past few weeks hadn’t really fazed Hunk, but realizing that Keith was in on it too floored him.  Even more so, the way the two of them kept looking at each other and talking without screaming their heads off was kinda freaking him out.

 

“Yeah, but he would take Blue and make an example out of her,” Pidge pointed out, taking a bite of her cheese.

 

Hunk saw Lance’s jaw tighten ever so slightly, “Which is why this _has_ to work,” he turned to face his friend, “Hunk, buddy.  Please?”

 

Hunk looked from Keith, to Pidge, and finally met Lance’s eyes.  He was doing that thing he knew Hunk could never say no.

 

“Okay, but just to put it on record, I was against this in the first place.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Shiro_

It took two hours from the time he woke for Shiro to begin worrying about where Keith was.  He hadn’t seen or heard from his brother, and the last time he _had_ seen Keith, the young Viking looked like he could blow flames.  Though it normally wouldn’t have bothered Shiro, as Keith could get frustrated easily, it did make him nervous that he hadn’t heard from anyone about Keith all morning.

 

“Hey Coran,” Shiro called to his friend, who was directing the staging of the arena for Lance’s fight later, “Have you seen Keith?”

 

Coran spun around and twirled his mustache, “Not since dawn this morning!  He, Hunk, Pidge, and Lance were all in in Number Five’s workshop last I saw!”

 

“What were they all doing in there?” Shiro asked, bewildered.

 

“I think they were trying to bond before Lance’s exam today; nothing like having your friends support you as you go off to fight an angry, dangerous dragon to the death!”

 

Shiro tried to ignore the obvious joy Coran’s voice had, “I didn’t think they all were that close.”

 

“Oh, they’re not!” Coran said brightly, “Which is why it’s so touching to see today!”

 

Shiro shook his head, “I guess so.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Two hours, a short lunch, and a packed stadium later, Shiro finally saw Keith for the first time that morning.

 

His adopted brother made his way through the crowds standing on top of the domed arena to Shiro, and he was slightly concerned with how somber Keith looked.  The expression on the pale boy’s face was akin to that of a funeral marcher’s, with his jaw tight and eyes hidden by his bangs.

 

“Keith, woah,” Shiro said the moment he got within range, “Are you okay, buddy?”

 

The boy nodded curtly, his clouded emotions a stark contrast to the joyful and excited energy all around them from the rest of the village. “I'm fine.”

 

“Hey,” he gripped Keith’s shoulder, “Just because Wrinkly didn't pick you doesn't mean that you're incapable of doing this, too.” He reassured Keith, trying to shake him out of this funk, “I promise, you'll kill your first dragon on the field, and when we need you the most you'll come in clutch, okay?”

 

Just then he got the high-sign from Coran that they were good to go.  He nodded, and with one last squeeze to Keith’s shoulder he turned to face the rest of the village.

 

“Okay,” he called out, “We ready to get this show on the road?”

 

He was answered with roars from the audience.

 

“Good! But first, let me say a few words,” Shiro faltered a bit; he had planned out what he was going to say the night before, but suddenly it didn't feel quite right.

 

“Today we celebrate a Paladin who has fought against all odds and risen to prove himself.  Today we welcome a new Viking. Today, Lance McClain become one of us!”

 

The crowd roared and cheered, chanting Lance’s name.

 

“Shiro,” Keith’s wrist was sudden and fierce on his arm, “Whatever happens, hear him out, okay?”

 

Shiro was taken aback, “What—?”

 

And then the Crimson Nightmare erupted from its cage.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Lance_

Here it was, the moment Lance had been looking forward to his whole life, and now most dreaded.  He had donned a helmet his mother had given him the night before, saying it was his father’s good luck charm.  Why his father hadn’t taken it with him on this last journey was a mystery to the both of them, but Rosa had insisted on Lance wearing it.

 

The weight of its significance was heavy on Lance.  He stood at the edge of the arena entrance, where Hunk and Pidge were waiting to see him off.

 

“Watch out for that dragon.” Hunk said nervously.  He was carrying a large bag filled with the supplies they’d need for the upcoming event.

 

“It’s not the dragon I’m worried about,” Lance replied, turning to look up at where Shiro and the council sat.  He could just see Keith making his way through the crowd towards Shiro, and his heart beat even faster.

 

“It’ll all be fine, Lance,” Pidge assured him, messing with her glasses.

 

Lance paused and turned to his best friends, “Just...if something ends up going wrong out there, make sure no one finds Blue.”

 

The two of them looked at each other and nodded. “We will, buddy,” Hunk replied, “Just promise me nothing’s gonna go wrong!”

 

Lance tried for one of his heart-breaking smiles, “What, my plan?  Go wrong?  Never!” he turned from his friends and walked out into the ring, where Coran and a table of weapons were waiting.

 

“Knock ‘em dead, Lance.” Coran smiled as he walked out beside Pidge and Hunk.

 

Lance took a deep breath as the portcullis closed behind him, locking him in the stone arena.  He went over to the weapons table, grabbed a shield and crossbow, and nodded up at the dragon’s cage.

 

“I’m ready.”

 

With a burst of flame the Crimson Nightmare clawed her way out of her enclosure and around the arena, smoke and magma billowing from every pore.  She then seemed to notice lance for the first time, and her yellow eyes became dangerous slits as she began to prowl towards him.

 

It took everything in Lance to not back up and hide behind his shield as the smoke burned his nostrils.  This dragon moved nothing like Blue, and though he’d seen a Nightmare in action before, he had never been this close to one.  The heat emanating from her was intense and threatening, and every instinct of Lance’s was to duck, run, hide, do _anything_ other than what he was about to do.

 

As the dragon approached him, Lance threw away his crossbow to the right, then his shield to the left.  Murmurs and hushed whispers of “What’s he doing?” rippled through the crowd.

 

“It’s okay,” Lance said to the dragon, gently trying to placate her, “I’m not gonna hurt you.”

 

The dragon faltered, suspicion evident in all her features.  She growled, eyeing his helmet.  Lance reached up slowly and removed it from his head.

 

With a silent apology to his father, Lance threw away the helmet. “I’m not one of them.”

 

The metal clang on the stone floor of the arena was louder than any battle cry Lance could remember.  Shiro’s low voice cut through the tension, “Stop the fight.”

 

“No.” Lance demanded, “You need to see this,” he cautiously reached out to the broad nose of the Nightmare, “These dragons aren’t what we think they are,” he called out, “we don’t have to kill them!”

 

“Lance!” Coran yelled, “What’re you doing?”

 

Lance ignored his mentor’s concern and locked eyes with the Nightmare in front of him, “Please,” he pleaded with her, “work with me.”

 

He looked up through the crowd and found Keith’s face, expression awe-struck and nervous.

 

“Keith,” he said quietly.

 

“I SAID STOP THE FIGHT!” Shiro bellowed, striking his metal fist against the bars above them.

 

And that’s when everything went to shit.

 

The dragon was sent into a terrified frenzy, and she set herself ablaze once more and snapped at Lance.

 

Lance screamed and scrambled back, trying to run from the dragon as she pursued him.

 

“LANCE!” he heard his friends above the commotion as he ran around the arena, avoiding being barbequed by the dragon’s fire.  He ran back to the weapons table and grabbed a shield as she slashed the wood to bits with her tail.

 

“Lance!” he heard Keith’s panicked voice across the ring, “Duck!”

 

The Paladin had barely a second to follow the command before a hammer flew from behind him and smacked the dragon’s snout.

 

“Hey!” he saw Keith wave his arms above his head to get the Nightmare’s attention, “Over here, hotshot!”

 

But the dragon ignored him and still pursued Lance, who ran around, desperately trying to find a way out of this mess.

 

“Lance!  Keith!” Hunk shouted, “Over here!”

 

Lance managed to look over and nearly cried in relief; Hunk and Pidge had risen the portcullis enough to let them through.  He saw Keith run in front of him and effortlessly slide under the opening to safety, and Lance was just about to follow suit when a blast of flame surged above his head and set the portcullis ablaze.

 

Lance skidded to the left and tripped over a fallen sword.  The dragon pounced on him immediately, trapping him underneath her foot and her heat.  Lance’s heart threatened to explode out of his chest and couldn’t breathe as a familiar high-pitched screech filled the air.  There was a sound like cannon fire, and then all he could see was blue smoke.

 

“NO!” Lance cried out as shouts of “Blue Fury!” and “Get in there and take it!” erupted from the shocked spectators.  He stood and ran towards the two dragons as they grappled with each other until Blue was able to throw down the Nightmare and scream a final time at her.  The Nightmare then shook her head and backed off while the Vikings began to jump into the ring.

 

“Blue!” Lance reached his dragon and tried to shove her away, “You have to go, now!”

 

When she didn’t respond, but instead bared her teeth at the quickly approaching armed Vikings, Lance tried pushing her again.

 

“Blue, go!” he commanded, but she didn’t listen and instead lashed out and attacked the Vikings as they came, smacking them to the ground with her tail and knocking the weapons from their hands.  Shiro charged at her with a battle cry, and before Lance could cry out she tackled the Chief to the ground, pinning him under her massive body.

 

“No!” Lance yelled as she began to charge her blast, “Blue, stop!” in an act of desperation he made a noise she had made before, “ _Nee-ah!_ ”

 

Immediately she stopped and turned to look at him.  Dread filled his bones as Shiro used her momentary distraction to gain the upper hand, and all the Vikings pounced on her, subduing her like any other dragon.

 

“No, wait, please!” Lance pleaded, unable to tear his eyes away from her, “Don’t hurt her!   _Por favor!_ ” he started to run over to her but was stopped by the strong arms of Hunk, “ _No le hagas daño_ — _mi Azul!_ ”

 

The dragon moaned at the mention of her name, and Lance saw Shrio be offered an axe.

 

Lance’s voice came out weakly, shock starting to settle in his system, “Don’t—please.”

 

He watched as Shiro shook his head at the axe, “Put it with the others.”

 

Lance almost laughed with relief that she was still alive, but any good feelings he had disappeared the moment Shiro laid eyes on him.  Lance’s blood ran cold under that glare, and Hunk’s grip around him tightened.  The Chief slowly and deliberately approached the two of them, and Lance tensed.

 

“Hunk Garrett,” Shiro’s voice was dangerously calm, “release him.”

 

Hunk looked like he wanted to do anything other than that, but with a feeble nod from Lance, he let go.

 

Shiro fixed Lance with a look that was raw and barely restrained, “Come with me.” the Chief turned and walked out of the ring, leaving Lance no choice but to follow and abandon Blue.  He wanted to free her and run far and away and never look back, but Hunk beside him reminded him he had to do this.  He’d made his choice, and he’d live with it.  So he followed Shiro to town hall, where the older Viking stood in the center of the room with his back to Lance.

 

“Tell me, Lance,” he said eerily calm, “was everything a trick?  Was this all some game to you?”

 

Lance could barely make out his form in the dim light filtering through the open door behind them, “Shiro—”

 

“We had a deal, Lance!”

 

“Look, I screwed up, I should’ve told you and the others before, but—” Lance floundered, “Just—take this out on me, Shiro.  Be mad at me, banish me, whatever you like, just _please_ , don’t hurt Blue.”

 

Shiro turned around, “The _dragon_ ?” he began walking towards Lance, “ _That’s_ what you’re worried about?  Not the people you almost killed?”

 

“She—she was just protecting me!” Lance stammered, “She’s not—she’s not dangerous, Shiro!”

 

“They’ve killed hundreds of us!” Shiro exclaimed.

 

“And we’ve killed thousands of them!” Lance yelled back.

 

“I don’t think you quite understand how much those monsters have broken our village.  We’ve lost too many good people to their hunger, and I cannot let that injustice be unanswered.”

 

“No, Shiro, I _do_ understand.  I was there, remember?  When you lost your arm, when Matt Holt was taken, _I was there_.  I saw everything, Shiro, I was witness to the worst horrors the dragons have to offer!” though he would never admit it, Lance still had nightmares about that night.

 

“And you still defend them?”

 

“I have to, because they don’t have anyone to defend them from their own kind!  They raid and pillage us because they have to; if they don’t bring enough food back, they’ll be eaten _themselves_ !  There’s...something _else_ on their island, some _demonio_ that—”

 

“Their Island?” Shiro cut him off, a sudden change in his posture, “You found the nest?”

 

Lance’s stomach dropped, “Did I say _el nido_?”

 

“How did you find it?” Shiro pressed forward, encroaching on Lance’s space.

 

“We—I—it was Blue, she took us there—only a dragon can find it.”

 

A ravenous and ferocious look came into Shiro’s eyes as Lance saw an idea form.

 

“Oh no,” Lance knew what he was thinking, “No, no, Shiro please, it’s not what you think!  You have no idea what you’re up against it’s nothing like you’ve ever seen!”

 

Shiro shoved past Lance, ignoring him.

 

“Shiro, _por favor_ !  I promise you can’t win this one!” he called after the Viking to no avail, “ _Jefe Platino,_ ” he whispered and ran after him, gripping onto his metal arm, “ _For once in your life would you please_ — _”_

 

“ENOUGH!” Shiro snapped and threw Lance off of him with such force the gangly boy crashed to the cold ground, “You’ve thrown your lot in with them,” the chief’s eyes burned with rage, “You’re not a Viking.  You’ve never been a Viking.  And you’ll never be one.”

 

Lance was infinitesimal under the shadow of Shiro as he turned and left, shouting to ready the ships.  

 

_Maybe it would have been better to have run away, after all._

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Keith_

The moment Shiro and Lance left, the dragon, Blue, began to thrash again and try to escape.  She snapped and snarled and struggled in vain trying to reach her paladin.  Keith remembered the way it had felt to ride on her back last night, the smell of Lance pressed against him—

 

He couldn’t bear to see the dragon in such pain and ran after his brother and Lance.  The look on Shiro’s face hadn’t betrayed any emotion, which scared Keith more than anything.  His brother was composed, but not like _that_.

 

Keith reached the entrance to town hall right as Shiro exited.  His expression was one he had only seen once before: a mixture of rage, determination, and insurmountable grief.  It was the face he’d worn when he was declared chief.

 

“Shiro!” Keith called out, alarmed.

 

“Ready the ships!” his brother didn’t look at him.

 

“Shiro,” Keith panted and ran up to him, “Wh—?”

 

Shiro’s arm flung out and pinned Keith in place, “Did you know?” there was a dangerous edge to his voice.

 

Keith was startled, “Know what?”

 

“That _dragon_ .  The _nest_.”

 

Keith took a deep breath. “Oh.”

 

“Did you know?”

 

Shiro looked at him, and after a quick study Keith knew immediately that whatever had just happened between him and Lance had not been good.

 

“I knew something was up with Lance, but I wasn’t sure what.”

 

Shiro’s shoulders sagged in relief and he released Keith, “Good.  Watch him and make sure he doesn’t do anything else stupid.” he began to walk away.

 

“Where are you going?” Keith asked.

 

“I know how to find the Nest using the Blue Fury.  No time to waste.”

 

Keith’s voice came out strangled, “What?  No!”

 

Shiro turned to look at him, alarmed.

 

“I mean—” Keith raced through things to say in his head, “Without me?”

 

Shiro’s eyes softened, “Sorry, buddy, but I need you here.  If anyone can keep Lance in his place, it’s you.”

 

Unsure how he really felt about that, but knowing what Shiro wanted from him, Keith nodded.

 

“Be careful.”

 

* * *

 

 

It took less than an hour for all of the battleships on Arus to be ready for departure, and it took less than an hour for them to be gone, Blue chained onto the first boat: the boat Shiro and Coran led.

 

It also took less than an hour for Lance to emerge from town hall, more grim and grief-stricken than Keith had ever seen, and immediately he knew he never wanted to see again.

 

“Lance—” he began, but he found he had no words.  He was afraid that no matter what he said he would only hurt Lance more.  So they said nothing.

 

They walked together to the high docks overlooking the battleships and watched as the village prepared and took off.

 

It took less than an hour for Hunk and Pidge to find the pair of them, staring at the multi-colored sails in the distance.

 

“You must feel horrible,” Pidge spoke after a moment, “I mean, you lost everything.  Your respect, your village, your best friend…”

 

“Thank you for summing that up, Pidge.” Hunk said sarcastically.

 

Keith couldn’t see Lance’s face, but his copper-colored fists were shaking.

 

“Why couldn’t I have just killed that dragon when I found it in the woods?” he muttered, “It would have been better for everyone.”

 

“Yeah,” Pidge sighed, “The rest of us would’ve done it.”

 

Keith then asked the question he’d been thinking for the last night and day, “So why didn’t you?”

 

“I—” Lance shrugged, “I don’t know.  I couldn’t.”

 

“That’s not really an answer.”

 

He turned to face Keith, “Why is this so important to you all of a sudden?”

 

“Because I want to remember what you say, right here, right now.” Keith pushed back.

 

Lance threw up his hands, “ _Por el amor de_ —I was a coward!  I was weak!  I wouldn’t kill a dragon!”

 

“You said ‘wouldn’t’ that time,” Hunk piped up.

 

“Fine, I wouldn’t!” he yelled, “Three hundred years, and I’m the first Viking who wouldn’t kill a dragon!”

 

Keith and the other two stared at Lance with this confession, and he couldn’t help but feel an odd sense of pride bloom in his chest.

 

“First to ride one, though,” Pidge commented, “So…”

 

Lance sighed and faced the three of them, “I wouldn’t kill her because she looked as frightened as I was.  I looked at her...and saw myself.”

 

“Well, I bet she’s really frightened now,” Hunk coaxed, “What’re you gonna do about it this time?”

 

Lance shrugged, a semblance of his old smile surfacing, “Probably something stupid.”

 

“Good,” Hunk replied, “But you’ve already done that.”

 

Lance met Keith’s eyes, “Then something crazy.” he took off sprinting down the docks.

  
Oh how much Keith loved this boy, “That’s more like it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *11PM*
> 
> Me: okay okay is it too ambitious to try and write this whole chapter in one sitting?  
> also me: nah fam you good you can do this
> 
> *two hours later*
> 
> Me: *asleep on notebook*


	10. The Battle at Marmora's Gate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***dragons***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I honestly am running out of ways to say thank you for being so wonderful and lovely and perfect thank you thank you, thank you!!! <3

_Coran_

It had been months since Coran had been on a hunting mission to Marmora’s Gate, yet still it looked the same as it always did.  The fog and mist curled out above the waters, taller than mountains and thicker than their armor.  The ships would be swallowed by it and be able to see just far enough to know if you were about to crash to your doom or not.

 

Coran looked around at the ships behind their own, and then to the Blue Fury Lance had so fervently protected.  She was a beauty, with skin and scales reflecting the color of the sky, and yellow eyes in dangerous slits.  She had given up trying to escape shortly after they had lost sight of Arus, but every so often Coran would hear the chains she was bound in rattle as she pulled and strained against them.  

 

His gaze then flit to her tail; half of it was blue like the rest of her, and the other was white cloth not unlike the waterproof material they made their sails with.  Seeing the care taken into the creation of such a perfect tailfin made Coran’s chest tighten every so slightly.  He remembered the look of panic on Lance’s face as he begged Shiro not to hurt her, and now seeing this same dragon bound and chafing under the iron left a sour taste in his mouth.

 

He turned away from the dragon to Shiro and the path ahead. “So, what’s the plan?” he asked the young Chief.

 

Shiro didn’t turn to look at him as he answered, “Find the nest and take it.”

 

The dragon behind them moaned, a final protest of their mission.

 

“Right,” Coran muttered, “Nothing to it.”

 

* * *

 

_Keith_

Keith, Pidge, and Hunk were sprinting after Lance as fast as they could while the long-legged boy rushed to Hunk and Pidge’s workshop.

 

“Okay, so the way I see it,” Lance said excitedly as he ran through the shop like a whirlwind, “Shiro’s not going to stop until either all the dragons are dead, or all the Vikings are dead.”

 

“Lance!” Pidge cried out, “What’re you doing?  Stop touching my equipment!”

 

The boys ignored her, “Pretty much sums it up, yeah,” Hunk agreed with Lance, grabbing the back of Pidge’s shirt to keep her from tackling Lance.

 

“But,” Lance disappeared around the corner, “If we could find a way to get there and take down the real threat—”

 

“The queen dragon,” Keith added, starting to get an idea of where he was going with this.

 

“—then maybe we can save both Vikings and dragons!” Lance finished, coming back around the corner.  His arms were leaded with tools and ropes, and he beamed at all of them brightly, “We just have to get there fast; at this rate they’re probably already to the island.”

 

“But how?” Pidge asked, “They took all the fastest boats, and didn’t you say only a dragon can find the nest?”

 

“Yes, I did,” Lance smirked, and Keith immediately knew what he was thinking.

 

“No way,” Keith’s eyes went wide.

 

Lance turned to him and nodded, blue eyes sparkling.

 

“You’re sure about this?”

 

“Of course I am!”

 

“Are they ready for this?” Keith gestured to Hunk and Pidge.

 

“Wait, what’s happening?” Hunk yelped.

 

“Definitely.” Lance grinned.

 

“Alright,” Keith grinned back.

 

“Hello?  Can one of you please fill us in here?” Pidge sighed.

 

Lance turned to face his friends, “We’re gonna fly in and save the day!”

 

* * *

 

_Blue_

The Blue Fury strained one last time against the shackles all around her before the call took control over her.  The moment she heard a whisper of the other dragons, it was over.  Her body went on autopilot, though the cool, rational voice in her head yelled at her to stop.  But she couldn’t, no matter how hard she tried and how much she resisted.  She knew the way to what once had been her dwelling, and was leading _them_ straight to it, just as she had been forced to lead the two boys just the night prior.  Oh how scared she had been for the long one—her “Lance” as it sounded to be—when she brought him and his “Keef” there.  She wasn’t sure what to make of this “Keef” quite yet, but he was Lance’s, so it seemed she was stuck with him.

 

But now _they_ were forcing Blue to go back to the one place Lance had kept her safe from these past few weeks, and the only terror she truly felt was for herself and the other dragons.

 

Prorock was going to destroy them all.

 

* * *

 

_Lance_

As the four Paladins walked toward the arena, Lance swore and hid behind a lampost.

 

“What is it?” Pidge whispered.

 

“There’s someone guarding the entrance!” Lance hissed, “Shiro must’ve figured I’d try and free the other dragons and made sure I couldn’t.” he grit his teeth and curled his hands into fists.  Why couldn’t Shiro ever just _listen_ to him?

 

“I can get us in,” Keith said, looking over at the guard.

 

“You sure?” Hunk asked.

 

Keith nodded, “Positive.  This is part of why I didn’t fight Shiro when he told me to stay here.  I knew you’d need my help to get anything done, since no one’ll listen to you three.”

 

Pidge rolled her eyes, “How thoughtful.”

 

Lance pursed his lips, “And the other part?”

 

Keith’s violet eyes met his and smirked, “Shiro told me to keep you in your place, and your place is on a dragon’s back.”

 

Lance wanted nothing more than to grab Keith’s face and kiss him then and there, not caring one lick who was watching.  But he restrained himself and simply let his face grow hot.

 

“Oh for Odin’s sake,” Pidge muttered, “the two of you are going to make me sick, can we _please_ get on with this?”

 

Keith nodded, and with one last glance at Lance he walked out over to the guard.  Lance, Pidge, and Hunk all stuck their heads around the lampost to watch as he and the Viking exchanged greetings.  After a moment Keith gasped and pointed to the sky, a horrified look on his face, and as the guard spun to look Keith clubbed the Viking over the head with his knife handle.  The guard then crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

 

“That was intense,” Hunk commented above Lance.

 

Keith turned to the three of them, waving them over.

 

“Let’s go,” Lance ran up the path to the arena and right in, still carrying the ropes and things.  He dumped them on the ground and went over to the Crimson Nightmare’s cage, “Keith,” he called, “Would you—”

 

“Way ahead of you!” Keith responded, running to the cage’s latch.

 

“Whoa, hold up!” Hunk yelped, “You’re just gonna let it out?  Shouldn’t we, I don’t know, talk to it first or whatever?”

 

“As long as we stay calm we should be golden,” Lance reassured his friend, “Probably.”

 

Keith gently hit the release.

 

Lance stood in front of the Nightmare’s cage, and he hoped against hope that she would be just as calm as the door that was slowly opening.  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Keith join Hunk and Pidge in the middle of the arena, and was thankful he had hidden his knife.  They couldn’t afford to have a Nightmare go crazy on them if she saw the blade.  

 

He kept his eyes fixed on the door as the Crimson Nightmare slowly emerged, eyes open in curiosity and back arched in suspicion.  She took slow and deliberate steps, glancing over the four teens warily.

 

“Good to see you again, girl,” Lance said gently, approaching the dragon, “Look, I know we got off to a rocky start earlier, but we really need your help.”

 

The dragon paused and narrowed her eyes, looking dubious.  She flicked her tail and sat on her haunches, making the strange clacks of dragon-tongue.

 

“We’re not here to hurt you,” he promised, “We’re here to set you free.”

 

“Stop!” a voice yelled from the arena entrance.

 

Lance whirled around to see a second guard standing there, dumbfounded.

 

“What’re you doing?” he demanded, “Get away from that thing, it’s dangerous!”

 

Faster than Lance could think Keith ran over, knocked the weapon out of the other Viking’s hand, and closed him in a headlock, “Hey, we’re trying to bond with this dragon, here, so could you please just chill for a second?”

 

The three Paladins and dragon all stared as the Viking struggled under Keith’s grip, then fell unconscious with a thump on the ground.

 

“Remind me to _never_ make him angry,” Hunk said quietly to Pidge, to which the small girl nodded.

 

Next to Lance, the Crimson Nightmare growled appreciatively and went quickly to Keith.  She sniffed at him and curled her tail around his legs.  Lance felt a cool fear go through his system before the Nightmare sat up and licked Keith, drenching half his face in drool and matting the side of his mullet to his head.  Keith then laughed and placed his hands gently on his dragon’s nose, and Lance felt his heart swell and cheeks warm just by looking at him.

 

“Good dragon,” the Paladin muttered, grinning.

 

* * *

 

_Shiro_

As the fog became thicker and the ominous callings of dragons crescendoed, Shiro began to see one especially large-looking seastack looming in the darkness.  The dragon shackled at the bow guided them forward, showing them the way to the nest.

 

The Dragons’ Nest.  The island he had been searching for non-stop these past three years was finally within his grasp.  So why did something feel so... _wrong_?  Why was the pit of his stomach heavy and writhing at the thought that once all of the dragons were taken care of in the nest, this Blue Fury would be next?

 

Shiro didn’t have time to think about it, however, as they finally got a clear visual on the island.  He led the ships of his people to the shore, and with a satisfying crunch they landed, one by one.

 

Shiro made his way forward across the ship and past the dragon.  It seemed to have broken out of the trance it had fallen into and was struggling, again and again pulling backwards, sa if trying to fly up and away from there.

 

If Shiro had been thinking more logically, he would’ve wondered why a dragon would want to run from their own nest and possibly reconsidered things.  But he wasn’t, so he didn’t, and he ignored Blue as she struggled in vain.

 

Shiro swung himself over the side of the boat onto the black sand, and immediately the island fell silent.  The beasts knew they were here.

 

“This is it,” Shiro muttered and turned t face his people, “Ready the catapults!”

 

* * *

 

Within ten minutes all of the VIkings had come ashore, carrying weapons and setting up a camp worthy of any long-term siege.  The catapults were rigged and set, sharpened logs were stuck in the ground as spikes and emergency spears, and everywhere there was the sound of weapons being drawn for battle.

 

Shiro drew a hasty diagram in the sand for the council, “Once we use the catapult to break open the mountainside, all hell is gonna break loose.  So no matter how this ends, this ends today.” he looked up to see all of them nod, and for a fleeting moment he wondered if this would be any of their last battles.  The council members disbanded to oversee their divisions, and Shiro turned to face Rosa McClain.

 

“Chief Shirogane,” she said with no preamble or semblance of greeting, “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

 

Shiro couldn’t help but hear the challenge in her voice.  She wasn’t talking about taking the nest.

 

“I did what had to be done for our people.”

 

Rosa’s nostrils flared, and without breaking eye contact with him she donned her helmet and turned back to her division.  Shiro also continued on, making straight for the face of the mountain.  At his signal the catapults fired, all aiming at one point in the mountainside.  With a loud crash the rock broke open and all the Vikings began to cheer.

 

Shiro climbed to the new cave opening and could see only darkness.  He raised a hand, and instantly one of their torch catapults fired, lighting up the entire inside of the cave.  Dragons covered the expanse of the walls and ceiling, all shapes and sizes, colors and kinds.  They were all here, under one roof.

 

Shiro let out a guttural war cry and rushed into the cave, slashing and striking at anything that moved.

 

In the same instant every dragon flew out of the cave, over the heads of Shiro, Coran, and every other Viking there.  The Vikings yelled and swung at the dragons, but to no avail.  It was as if the creatures wanted nothing to do with them, only to get out and away.  No dragon attacked them, none of the thousands of reptiles blew a spark in their direction, and none of them tried to carry anyone away.

 

“Is that it?” Coran asked as the last few dragons flew out and away.  He stepped out of the cave in disbelief and shouted victoriously to the rest of the Arusian Vikings.

 

A loud and confused cheer broke through the odd quiet, and Shiro stepped out of the cave as well.  Something didn’t quite settle well in his gut about this, and his suspicions were only confirmed when he looked out over the beach to where the Blue Fury remained chained to his ship.

 

The creature looked terrified, pulling and pushing and trying all the more to free herself and fly away.

 

“This isn’t over!” Shiro shouted, “Form your ranks!  Hold together!”

 

A low tremor started to shake the foundations of the island, and before him in the cave the rock began to crack and break like an earthquake.  There was a guttural, inhuman roar that came from the heart of the mountain, causing Shiro’s hair to stand on end.

 

“Fall back!” he yelled and dashed from the cave entrance, “Get back!”

  
And that was when all hell broke loose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM YOUR PALADIN!!
> 
> I'M BONDING WITH YOU!!


	11. The Fiendishly Clever Plan Goes Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know what happens here

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No words can describe the happiness I have anytime I check my inbox and receive another lovely comment from you all about this work. Thank you, bless you. <3

_ Keith _

As the four paladins flew across the eastern sea to Marmora’s Gate, Keith could only pray that they wouldn’t be too late.  He had seen what the queen dragon could do, and none of it was good news for the Arusian Vikings.  He hoped that his brother would be able to see reason before things got out of hand, but Shiro’s face when he had left made Keith fear the worst.

 

Lance must’ve felt Keith tense, because the gangly boy’s arms tightened reassuredly around him, “We’ll make it in time, Keith,” he whispered in his ear, “It’ll be fine.”

 

Keith turned his head to look at the Paladin behind him and smiled grimly, “I hope you’re right.”

 

They plunged into the thick fog, Keith and Lance on the Crimson Nightmare Keith affectionately named Red, Hunk beside him on the back of the Gronkle, and Pidge on his other side astride the Deadly Nadder.  It had been easier than Keith had expected to get them on the dragons, and while none of them were “good” at flying, per se, Lance had assured the three of them that their dragons would do most of the work.

 

Keith, for one, was thankful this was the case.  He could barely see through the gray and humid air around them, and was glad Red seemed to know where they were trying to go.

 

But visibility didn’t see to matter as the air was suddenly filled with shouts and exclamations, clattering weapons and the tremulous roar of a monster.  The smell of smoke was rank in the air.

 

Keith tensed and urged Red on faster, “Let’s go, girl.”

 

With a sudden rush the Paladins emerged through the fog to a world on fire.  It was all Keith could see, red and yellow and searing hot, and for one terrifying moment he believed his brother and the others were lost to it.  But with a quick scan of the area Keith could see all the Vikings running around on the other end of the island, fleeing the inferno that had been the once brightly-colored and unsinkable ships.  His gaze then caught on two figures running toward the center of the island, in the opposite direction of the other Vikings, a flash of impossibly orange hair on one and a streak of white on the other.

 

Keith nearly did a double-take.  Shiro and Coran were shouting and throwing things at what he had thought at a cursory glance was the mountainside.  But it wasn’t the mountain.  It was a dragon, bigger and more terrifying than anything Keith had ever seen, and he wondered how he missed the creature the first time around.

 

It was the queen of this island, and she had awoken to devour them all.  He could see it in the glint of her scales, the smoke billowing from her large nostrils, and the deadness in her six purple eyes.  Nothing would stop her save triumph, or death.

 

Shiro picked up one of the spears stuck in the ground and threw it at the dragon’s eye, his aim true and meeting its mark.

 

The queen blinked and turned to look at the Vikings below her, screaming and yelling for her attention.  Keith wondered why they weren’t with the others and trying to escape when it clicked: Shiro and Coran were live bait, the distraction so the rest of the village could escape.  A ferocious emotion blossomed in Keith’s chest at this realization, and when the queen reared her head back to strike at the two of them his instinct kicked and in perfect unison with his thoughts Red sent a white-hot blast at the dragon’s head. The sheer force of the blow sent the queen reeling, though Keith wasn’t sure it did any really damage.

 

“Nice one Keith!” Hunk yelled from his Gronkle.

 

The three dragons soared in near perfect formation around the queen, and Keith almost couldn’t believe how  _ big  _ it was.  Shiro and Coran were miniscule compared to it as they stared up at the four teens in the air.

 

“Alright guys, let’s do this!” Lance called to them all, “Hunk, break it down!”

 

“Oookay,” Hunk said, “Large jaw and tail for bashing and crushing, small eyes, large nostrils, and huge ears.  Relies on hearing and smell!”

 

“Ten-four!” Lance replied, “Pidge, I want you to see if this thing has a shot limit; make it mad and draw out its fire!  Hunk, I want you to find its blind spot and try to see if we can disorient it enough to keep it from getting Pidge.  We’ll join both of you shortly!”

 

“On it!” Pidge nodded and flew off.

 

“Let’s go!” Hunk whooped, following her.

 

“Okay,” Lance murmured against Keith’s neck, “Let’s go find my best girl.”

 

They pitched to the right over by the burning ships, where Keith and Lance began fervently searching for Blue amongst the flames.  The sounds of Pidge and Hunk fighting the queen were all behind them, and keith tried to stay focused on task and not to worry about them.  

 

“C’mon come  _ on _ !” Lance said, “Where are you, Blue?”

 

The heat was unbearable.  Sweat began to bead and drip down Keith’s forehead and back in the heat, and anxiousness started to crawl up his skin when he remembered something Shiro had told him a long time ago, “Lance, patience yields focus.  Don’t give up.  She down there, I know it!”

 

He felt Lance nod against his back and continued searching for the Blue Fury.  there was a strangled cry from one of the ships, and Keith spotted a swish of a tail.

 

“Over there!” He pitched Red towards the dragon and got low enough for Lance to hop onto the boat safely.

 

The gangly boy gave Keith one last squeeze around the waist and jumped. “Go help the others!  We’ll be right there!”

 

Keith nodded, “Be careful!” and though he didn’t want to abandon Lance, Keith urged Red up and over to where Pidge and Hunk were fighting.  Pidge, the little gremlin, was flying in circles around the queen, shouting profanities so offensive Keith was surprised the dragon didn’t drop dead immediately.  Hunk was doing his best to keep his dragon level and steady whilst banging his hammer against his shield as hard as he could.  The poor Gronkle, however, couldn’t take the strain and bucked Hunk off of his back and onto the head of the queen, clinging to the tip of her ears.

 

“Ahh!” Hunk yelled, “Guys, what do I do?”

 

“Try and slide down by its eyes!” Keith yelled, “get a foothold if you can!”

 

Hunk carefully did so, and Keith had to force back a shudder at the size of the queen’s eyes.

 

“Now what?”

 

“Now this!” Keith pulled a hammer from his belt and tossed it at the Paladin, “Blind it while Pidge and I buy Lance time!”

 

Keith and Red then zoomed through the air joining Pidge in the effort to draw out its fire, though he had the unsettling suspicion that this thing didn’t  _ have  _ a shot limit.  But surely it had to, right?

 

He wasn’t able to figure that out, however, as the dragon snapped and lunged at Pidge, body thrashing about and crashing into the ships and mountainside.  Thankfully Pidge was able to avoid the creature’s teeth, but she didn’t see its tail lash out from behind right at her.  Keith barely had time to cry out a warning before she was swatted out of the air by the creature’s mace-like tail.

 

“Pidge!” Keith screamed as he watched the bright green Nadder go down.  It landed with a loud crash on the rocky beach.

 

He flew faster than he thought possible to the small girl, crumpled on the ground three feet away from where her dragon landed.

 

“Pidge!” he jumped off Red and knelt beside her, “Oh gods no,” she groaned as he turned her over onto her back, and Keith nearly sighed in relief.  She was alive, at least for now.

 

Gently Keith lifted the small girl into his arms and on Red as a high-pitched screech penetrated the chaos, and Keith saw a flash of sky blue emerge from the fiery ships.

 

“He’s up!”

  
  


_ Lance _

Lance had never realized just how sturdy the Arusians made their chains until he had to try and break one.  The moment he touched down on the burning ship Lance began trying to find the weakest link so he could free Blue.  He tried to ignore the blazing ship’s oppressive heat, Blue’s chafed scales from the oppressive chains, and the sounds of his friends battling the oppressive queen dragon.  Lance tugged and strained on the metal trying to find some way to disconnect it, all the while muttering assurances to Blue that it was okay, they’d make it out, he’d never let anything like this happen again.

 

The queen stomped and shook the ship, the mast crashing dangerously close to him and Blue in a shower of sparks and heat.

 

“You okay, girl?” Lance worried as the ship creaked and groaned.

 

With a sudden lurch the wood crumbled beneath him, and they were plunged into the dark waters.  Lance tried not to panic as he swam after Blue sinking quickly, grabbing the chain once again and desperately trying to pull it free.

 

But Lance had never been the best swimmer, and he felt himself losing oxygen quickly.  He couldn’t stop, though.  Not now, when to go back to the surface would be to lose Blue forever.  Spots began to dance before his eyes, his body demanding air, oxygen, atmosphere. Without warning something grabbed Lance from behind and dragged him to the surface.  He gasped and choked as the smoke-scented air rushed into his lungs, and barely had a chance to find his savior before the Viking dove under the surface after Blue.

 

“Lance!” Coran was there beside him, completely dry, “Are you alright?”

 

“Coran?” Lance asked drunkenly, “Who―?”

 

But his question was answered before he could ask it as Blue shot out of the water, dragging Shiro along with her and dumping him on the rocky beach beside them.  The older Viking coughed as he regained oxygen as well, the white streak of his hair plastered to his forehead.

 

Blue shook the water out of her ears and turned to Lance with an expression of, “ _ You coming? _ ”

 

Relief and happiness burst in Lance’s chest as he stood, “You got it, girl.”

 

He moved to jump on the Blue Fury’s back when a cold, metallic hand grabbed his wrist, “Lance, wait!”

 

The Paladin froze as he looked at Shiro, soaking wet and chest heaving.

 

“I’m sorry,” the Chief said, “For everything.  I was blinded by my own hatred and wasn’t a very good leader to you.  Forgive me.”

 

There was a difference between brushing off hurtful acts and forgiving someone, but all Lance had ever wanted was respect.  And that’s what Lance was looking at.

 

He nodded at the Chief, knowing that no matter how things ended today, Shiro would become a better Chief and Viking because of it.

 

Shiro closed his eyes and clapped him on the shoulder, “I’m proud to have you as a part of this Village.”

 

Lance gulped as Shiro released him, “Thank you, sir.  I’ll do my best to make you proud.” he turned to Blue and jumped on her back.

 

“Lance!” Coran yelped, “Be careful; things are looking pretty rough out there.”

 

Lance smirked at his teacher and Chief, “We’re Vikings.  It’s an occupational hazard.” he strapped himself into Blue’s harness and turned to face the queen dragon, “Let’s do this!”

 

The two of them sped through the air, and with a familiar cry Blue let loose a string of blasts across the right side of the giant dragon.  He saw Hunk smashing a hammer into her eyes, yelling and screaming.

 

“Hunk!” Lance called to his friend.

 

“Lance!” Hunk paused in his work to look up at them, “It got Pidge!”

 

His blood ran cold, “What?”

 

“Yeah, she crashed over there somewhere.  Keith went to go make sure she was okay!”

 

Lance shook his head, “We have to get you out of there, now.  Do you trust me?”

 

“You know I do!”

 

“Then when I say jump, do it!” he said and flew once more around the queen, “Ready?”

 

“Whenever you are!”

 

“Okay,” Lance made a dive for the dragon’s eyes, “JUMP!”

 

Hunk ran and jumped off her head, screaming as he free-fell through the air.  Lance dove straight for him and with a lurch Blue snatched him out of the air in her claws.

 

“Did you get him?” Lance panicked slightly, looking for a sign that his friend wasn’t a splat on the sand.

 

Blue rumbled happily below him, and he sighed in relief.  They pitched over to where the Crimson Nightmare and Deadly Nadder were standing beside their Paladins.  Keith had Pidge curled in his arms, and once Blue touched down he ran to meet Lance and Hunk.

 

“Pidge!” Hunk cried out, enveloping the small girl in his massive and gentle grip, “Is she okay?”

 

Keith nodded, clearing his throat, “She will be, I think, if we can get her to Coran quickly.” he looked at Lance, and the blue Paladin could tell he was looking for signs of injury.

 

“I’m fine, Keith,” Lance smiled feebly and inspected him also for burns or scrapes.  None.  He sighed and turned to the three dragons jabbering at each other.  It was obvious the Nadder was badly shaken and wouldn’t be up for any real flying anytime soon, and the Gronkle was nowhere to be seen, so that left the Crimson Nightmare and Blue to ride and fight with.  “Keith,” he turned to the messy-haired boy, “I want you to take Pidge and Hunk on Red over to the others.  Make sure Pidge gets medical attention, and help them find a way to get off this island.”

 

“Wait, what’re you gonna do?” Hunk demanded.

 

Lance eyed the queen as she shook her head and began to chomp on one of the wrecked boats, “I’m going to finish this.” he ran to Blue.

 

“Lance!” Keith yelled and grabbed his arm.  It was funny how lance knew immediately it was Keith and not his brother.  Where Shiro’s grip had been calm and sure, Keith’s was wiry and desperate, hungry for every inch of muscle, bone, and sinew. It made Lance feel electrified and his skin burned at the touch.

 

Lance closed his eyes as he turned back to him.  He couldn’t bear to see those violet eyes in pain,  “Keith, we don’t have time to discuss this.  People will die if I don’t act now.” 

 

“I know,” Keith said softly, and in shock Lance opened his eyes to meet Keith’s.  They were hard and determined, “I know nothing I could say will change your mind, so I’m not going to say anything.  Just be careful.”

 

Lance felt himself blush despite everything and nodded. “Let’s go, Blue!”

 

“Wait, one last thing!” Keith grabbed Lance’s face and kissed him.

 

It was fireworks and midnight rides and the gentle tide washing over his ankles.  It was Keith’s strong fingers on his jaw and his chest pressed to Lance’s and his lips his lips his  _ lips _ ― 

 

They separated, breathing heavily, noses gently touching, “You better come back to me.”

 

Lance had to remember how to breathe, “I’ll do my best.”

 

Keith sighed, and his breath washed over Lance’s face intoxicatingly, “You.”

 

Lance disentangled himself from Keith and jumped on Blue’s back, “Let’s go kick some dragon-ass!”

 

With a yelp Blue soared through the air and blasted at the queen dragon, evoking a powerful and fiery response from the monstrous creature.  The queen shook her head and body, and something unfurled on her back.

 

“She has wings,” Lance said, leaning in to talk to Blue, “Let’s see if she can use them!”

 

They blasted the dragon once more and then flew into the gray clouds.  Lance looked down below them to see that the queen was indeed following them, roaring and shooting fireballs at them.  He did his best to try and steer Blue clear of all of them, as he knew her tail prosthetic, unlike the rest of her, wasn’t fireproof.  The blazing ships were perfect evidence of that.  So they dodged and ducked, Lance trying to think of a plan, some way to take this monster down.

 

Just then he remembered something he’d heard Coran yell once during their training; he’d forgotten it until just now because he’d been fearing for his life at the moment, but something about this life-threatening fear made him remember every instruction Coran had ever given clearer than his own heartbeat.  He nearly laughed out loud; turns out Coran’s methods  _ were _ sound, after all!

 

“Blue, I think I know how to take this thing down!” he pressed against the dragon, trying to make himself as aerodynamic as possible, “But first we have to disappear.”

 

Blue growled appreciatively under him, and as they plunged deeper into the fog her scales changed color to reflect the sky around them.  Lance could hear the roars and screeches of the queen dragon as she flew up and hesitated in the air, flapping her giant wings and attempting to disperse the gray.  In frustration she inhaled deeply and spun around, sending a ring of fire through the sky and lighting up the clouds.

 

Then, when her back was turned, Blue blasted her right behind the ears and then flew out in front of her nose, almost taunting the bigger dragon.  The queen snapped and chased after them as they flew back down towards the island.

 

Lance could feel the heat radiating off of the queen as she trailed behind them, just out of jaw’s reach.  He then felt all the air being sucked in around him like a vacuum into the dragon’s mouth.

 

“Hold, Blue,” Lance tried to keep her steady and away from being swallowed as green gas filled the queen’s giant maw.

 

And just before the queen could light her own gas, Lance screamed.

 

“NOW!”

 

And with that, Blue spun around and sent one last powerful blast down the queen’s throat.

 

_ “Now, Paladins, one very important thing to remember about dragons―”  _

 

A strangled gasp came from the large dragon as all the gas inside her mouth ignited and backfired down her own gullet.

 

_ “―though they may be nearly indestructible and fireproof on the outside―” _

 

Some of the fire curled out from her mouth and snatched at Blue’s tail, setting it ablaze.

 

_ “―they are not so fireproof on the inside.” _

 

The queen dragon’s six eyes widened and smoke began to billow out of her nostrils and ears.  She began to fall to the ground, her wings disintegrating into ash from the inside.

 

_ “One lucky flaming arrow straight into the mouth of a dragon as it prepares to fire―” _

 

Blue’s tail fin smoldered to dust, sending the two of them spinning out of control and screaming.  

 

_ “―will burn the beast from the inside out.” _

 

Lance tried to regain any type of air he could, but without her tail to direct them, they could barely stay airborne.

 

The queen dragon crashed to the ground with a mighty roar, and the fire that consumed her from the inside erupted like a fiery mushroom and enveloped the air all around them.  All Lance could see and feel was fire, flames, and heat before the queen’s tail came out of nowhere and smashed into Blue.

  
Lance desperately tried to hold on as his body flew off of the saddle and his harness disconnected.  He barely had the moment to think  _ ‘I should really think about redesigning that’ _ before something smacked him on the back of the head, and his world went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I'm a terrible person, I'm sorry.
> 
> (I'm actually not) >:3c


	12. Just Exactly When is "Too Late"?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the end-all, be-all

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here we are, at the end of part one! (*sobs* finally)
> 
> Seriously, you all have been so amazing and supportive of this work, and that's what has kept me writing as my life has been going crazy. Thank you. I love you all so much. :3
> 
> And none of this would've been possible without Dawn letting me take a piece of her AU and run with it. So please send thanks and love to parfeitperi on tumblr. <333333333

_ Keith _

A long, long time ago, there was a relatively average-height viking with a relatively average-length name walking across a beach.  This Viking’s name was Keith Takashi Kogane, and he usually liked the beach, but on this night he was terrified.

 

After flying Hunk to safety and Pidge to Coran for medical attention, Keith turned to find his brother staring after the queen dragon and Lance as they battled.

 

“Shiro,” Keith called, “We have to find a way off of this island.”

 

His brother turned to face him, “You knew.  About all of this.”

 

It wasn’t a question, but Keith nodded anyway.

 

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

 

“Would you have listened?”

 

Shiro closed his eyes and took a deep breath, “Right.  There’s nothing I can do about it now except take care of my people.  Let’s find a way off this rock.”

 

Keith nodded, eager to be doing something.  It ate and chafed at him that he couldn’t fly with Lance, and even though in his head he knew it would only end in disaster if he tried, it didn’t help that every fibre of body told him to jump on Red and  _ fight _ .

 

The brothers had just turned back to their villagers when the queen dragon let out a mighty roar and unfurled wings larger and more colorful than their sails from her back.  The force of one flap from them nearly knocked Keith off of his feet, and he couldn’t help but stare up into the night as Blue shot into the sky, Lance whooping as the queen followed them into the clouds.  Prayers to any and every god Keith knew of crossed his mind as the night sky burned with fire.

 

Screeches and cries from both dragons echoed off the seastacks and mountains, filling their entire world with the sound of battle.  Around Keith the Arusians gasped and gazed at the sky, the blazing inferno illuminating harsh shadows of the two creatures.  Other strange sounds and calls began to trill near them, and when Keith looked around he saw that the dragons who had previously fled the island gathering around Red and Pidge’s Nadder.  They were communicating in their strange language of clacks and hisses and kept worriedly glancing at the sky.  Keith couldn’t tell if they were more concerned with the welfare of Blue and Lance, or their queen.  He hoped it was the former, as they had all seemed terrified of the queen before.

 

High above them the sky streaked with blasts and hazy smoke from the burning ships, again and again, until suddenly they stopped.  Keith searched the night sky desperately for any sign of a blue tail or fin, his heartbeat the only sound he could hear in the night.  Without warning a high-pitched screech cut through the night, and Keith had no idea what it was until he saw the familiar form of Blue emerge through the clouds as she dove straight for the ground, the queen right behind them.  The queen’s maw was open wide, spilling with gas, and Keith could tell she was about to strike when Blue spun around and blasted the dragon right in her mouth.  The gas inside the queen’s mouth exploded like a bomb, lighting her up from the inside out, and Keith couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride swell in his chest when he realized that Lance was using their training from Coran.

 

The queen crashed into the ground, a wave of heat and fire enveloping the island, and Keith knew she wouldn’t get up again.  He watched as Lance and Blue hovered above the carnage and looked for a place to land, but something was wrong.  He could see it in the way Blue seemed off-kilter, that instead of a graceful descent to the ground away from the crashing queen, she flapped and stuttered, dipping up and down dangerously.  

 

“What’s wrong with him?” Shiro called, looking over at Keith, “Or does he always fly like that?”

 

Keith shook his head, unable to do anything else.  A small stream of smoke trailed from Blue’s tail, and a cold numbness shot through his system.

 

“Her tail,” he gasped, staring open-mouthed at the sky, “It’s on fire!  Lance!” he spun around, his eyes raking over the crowd of people and dragons.

 

“What―” Shiro started, tearing his eyes from the falling Viking.

 

“Keith!” Hunk yelled, pointing at the sky, “Blue’s tail!”

 

“I see it!” Keith growled.   _ ‘Where did she go?’ _

 

“What’s going on?” Coran yelled.

 

“Half of Blue’s tail is a prosthetic Pidge and Lance designed!” Hunk explained, “Without it, she can’t fly, and they’re going to crash and burn if we don’t do something now!”

 

Keith finally spotted her, “Red!” he ran over to the dragon and stopped in front of her face, ignoring the other dragons beside her, “Lance and Blue need us; we’ve gotta get up there and save them!”

 

But they were too late.  Even as Keith climbed onto his dragon’s back he heard a bloodcurling scream emit from somewhere in the crowd.

 

“ _ ¡Mí hijo! _ ”

 

Keith whipped his head to the sky and watched in slow-motion as Blue lost control, spinning right into the tail of the queen dragon and throwing Lance from his saddle. He sat on Red’s back, paralysed with fear as he saw Blue dive after him, flapping her wings desperately to get to Lance.

 

There was a sickening crash, and the sound jarred Keith back to himself.  He urged Red upward, and they took to the sky.  The Crimson Nightmare swooped in low circles over the burning queen’s carcass as the last embers faded.  Keith searched for any sign of the Blue Fury amidst the bones and smoke.

 

“Lance!” he screamed, “Blue!”

 

Suddenly a flash of color broke through the bleach white and gray, and Keith’s heart tripped.  He dove right at the flash of sky blue, stopping short when he reached the ground.  Keith leapt from the back of his dragon and ran to Blue, frantically looking about the chasm created by her crash for any sign of Lance.

 

“Lance?” panic started to well up inside his chest, “Lance!  Where are you?”

 

Blue groaned and shifted across the beach, and Keith spun to look at her back.  Maybe somehow Lance had managed to― 

 

He froze as he saw the empty saddle and the damage it had taken in the fight against the queen.  It was barely anything more than a strip of burnt leather and warped metal loosely fitted to the Blue Fury’s back, and Keith felt he couldn’t breathe.  Something was crawling up his throat, thick and overwhelming as each breath came out more laboured than the last.

 

“No,” his voice came out strangled as he turned to look at Blue, who slowly opened her eyes.

 

“Keith!” he heard Shiro from far off, but he couldn’t make himself move.

 

It was every nightmare Keith had ever dreamt; losing Lance, not being able to say goodbye, never truly reconciling anything between them.  He stumbled over to Blue and fell to his knees, “That idiot,” he gasped.  “If he had let me tell Shiro like I wanted to in the first place this never would’ve happened.  He never would’ve―” he couldn’t finish as the thickness swallowed his lungs and overflowed out of him, tears streaming down his face.

 

He sat there for a moment, tears falling like the rain Lance had loved so much, until he felt a warmth against his cheek.  It was Red, gently rubbing her head against his.  Keith reached up and rubbed her forehead, still unable to speak.  He then turned to Blue, the dragon’s yellow eyes wary.  Footsteps sounded near to him, but he didn’t care.

 

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered to her, “He gave you a life again, and I couldn’t help you do the same.  Forgive me.”

 

With a curious sideways look at him, Blue lifted her wing, and curled there against her chest was Lance, chest rising and falling with every breath.

 

Keith let out an undignified yelp and scrambled over to him.  His limbs felt numb with shock as he cradled the boy he loves in his arms.

 

Lance groaned and fluttered his beautiful lashes, eyes locking immediately onto Keith’s violet ones.  “Keith?”

 

“Lance!” Keith choked on his own words, still nearly unable to believe it, “Are you okay?”

 

Lance gave Keith that cocky half-smirk that made his insides feel fuzzy, “We did it.  We are a good team.”

 

Keith couldn’t help but grin and bury his face into the crook of the blue-eyed Paladin’s neck.  He then turned to Blue and looked her straight in the eyes. “You brought him back to me.  Thank you.”

 

“Well,” Coran’s voice cut through the tension and made Keith jump, “Most of him.”

 

* * *

 

 

_ Lance _

Two days later, Lance’s eyes fluttered open to see Blue standing over him.  

 

“Blue?” he said, voice scratchy and deep.

 

The dragon’s eyes lit up as she smiled and attacked his face with excited licks and leapt about the room.

 

Lance immediately sat up and looked around, trying to get a sense of where he was. “I’m…in my house.   _ You’re  _ in my house,” he felt a strange panic start to rise in his chest, “Does Mama know about this?”

 

Blue ignored his concern, heedlessly attempting to take flight in the small wooden house but only succeeding in crashing into everything.

 

“Blue, come on, be more―” Lance moved to get up and control his dragon when he had to stop.  Something didn’t feel quite right with his left leg.  Actually, he couldn’t feel  _ anything _ at all.  He ripped off the covers of his bed, and his heart jumped into his throat.

 

Where his left leg should have been, from the mid-thigh down, was a metal prosthetic similar in design to Shiro’s right arm.  It was complex, made from several differently shaped and hand-crafted pieces all fixed together to look as close to a real leg as possible, complete with five individual toes and mechanisms to bend at the knee and ankle.

 

Lance took a deep breath, trying to keep from hyperventilating, and thought about moving his toes.  With a bit of concentration and effort, two metallic toes twitched.  A sigh of relief cut through his chest, and he slowly swung his legs over the side of the bed.  Blue scampered to his side and sniffed at the metal leg, sympathy and curiosity mingled together in her large eyes.

 

“I’ll be okay, girl.” Lance finally managed, bracing himself, “Just gotta...work through the adjustment.” the long-limbed Viking stood.

 

He took a deep breath and tried for a step.  Immediately the strange sensation of a heavier, metallic limb he wasn’t accustomed to struck him, and he would’ve fallen on his face had Blue not caught him.

 

Lance groaned, “Thanks, girl.”  he leaned on her as they walked through the house, and as they reached front door Lance felt he was starting to get an idea of how to move on his own again.  When he opened the door, a sight so unlike any that he had ever seen or dreamed greeted him that he thought for one moment that he was dead.  He  _ had _ to be, because…

 

He looked out over his village and saw dragons...and Vikings...together.  Rebuilding damaged houses; herding sheep; playing fetch;  _ coexisting _ .

 

Down the street Hunk turned and saw him, and his smile was so big and bright it nearly blinded Lance.

 

“LANCE!” his friend ran and enveloped him in a bear hug so tight he felt his ribs were going to break, “Guys, he’s awake!”

 

Instantly a swarm of people and dragons started to gather around them, and Lance felt a little overwhelmed, “What happened?  Did we win?  Am I dead?”

 

“We’ll tell you everything once we get you something to eat,” a familiar, sharp and serious voice called through the crowd.

 

Lance looked up and spotted Keith as he broke through the throng of people.  Lance felt his heart jump into his throat again, only this time it threatened to fly out of his chest to the Paladin Viking and run away forever.  It was a scary, yet not unwelcome feeling.

 

“Talking?  Eating?” he smirked, “Are you asking me out on a date?”

 

The entire crowd groaned, but Lance didn’t care as Keith just rolled his eyes and wrapped his arms tightly around the gangly boy. “You try anything like that again, and I swear I’ll kill you.”

 

Lance laughed and pulled back, gazing into violet eyes, “Duly noted.  I’ll make sure to let you be the reckless one from now on.”

 

Keith laughed too, and it was worth everything to see that true smile, wide and uninhibited.

 

“ _ ¡Mí hijo! _ ”

 

Rosa McClain burst through and hugged her son nearly as tight as Hunk had, “I thought I’d lost you.”

 

“It’s okay,  _ Mama _ .” Lance tried not to cry, “I’m okay.”

 

Lance looked over his mother’s shoulder and saw Shiro, Pidge, and Coran join in the circle around him.

 

“Shiro,” he began, “I’m so sorry―”

 

“You don’t need to say anything,” Shiro interrupted, “If anything, I should be the one apologizing.” he smiled at the young Viking, “It turns out that when dragons and humans take the time and patience to really listen and pay attention to each other, we go together pretty well.  You’re the perfect example of that.”

 

So many emotions flooded through Lance’s chest and fingertips at this praise.

 

“Well,” Pidge said, “Most of you.  You have Coran, Hunk, and I to thank for your left leg.  Seems the world thought there was only enough space for one of your mile-long legs.”

 

Lance laughed and glanced again at his metal leg, “It’s perfect.”

 

“Of course it’s not,” Coran exclaimed, “But with a few weeks of therapy and as Pidge develops her tech, you should be as good as new!  Better, in fact!”

 

Pidge and Hunk shook their heads at their teacher, “He’s right, it’ll take you awhile to get completely adjusted to the leg and the maintenance routine, but for now you should be good.”

 

Lance nodded and looked at all the people around him.  Without each of them playing a role in his life, he knew he never would’ve become the man he was then, and he was so thankful for all of them.  He then turned to Blue: his beautiful, incredible, wonderful dragon.

 

“This is Arus,” he smiled and showed her to his village, “It snows nine months of the year, and hails the other three.” he caught Pidge’s eye and received a smirk, “The food that grows here is tough and tasteless, and the people are even more so.” He winked at Hunk, “The only upsides are the pets.  Where some places might have ponies or parrots…” he met Keith’s eyes and then turned back to Blue.

 

“We have dragons.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -12AM, Wednesday
> 
> Me: *aggressively typing* Ah yes, PERFECT
> 
> -2PM, Thursday
> 
> Me: what the quiznack?
> 
> -2:01 PM, Thursday
> 
> Me: *aggressively rewrites everything*
> 
> Me: Okay, we good.

**Author's Note:**

> This has been so much fun to write; I've been involved with the "How to Train Your Dragon" series since Cressida Cowell started writing the books, and have had fun throwing in little 'easter eggs' from them into this
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!!  
> If you want, you can find me also on tumblr or instagram <3  
> tumblr: www.nerdy-cait05.tumblr.com  
> Insta: @nerdy_cait05
> 
> I plan to post bi-weekly on Wednesdays, so look for updates then!!


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